Rome 2

there was a good bit of interest in passive solar design for houses in the 1940s, particularly with wartime fuel shortages

• in the north these had coal or oil furnaces, as all but the poorest houses did, but would need less fuel
  
• designs with large insulated windows were promoted as being closer to nature
• It continued through the mid 1950s, then people stopped worrying about fossil fuel use until the 1970s
• The goal was the cheapest possible house, not one that would be cheaper to live in over the long run

• Farrington Daniels was a physical chemist who was director of the Metallurgical Laboratory of the Manhattan Project, then worked on peaceful uses of atomic energy, then on  solar energy, particularly for the developing world

• Solar hot water heaters were already in use in California and Florida
• but by the 1950s home heating oil was very cheap
• hopes that nuclear power would provide a new source of cheap electricity
• "too cheap to meter"
• direct solar power didn't have much potential for profit so didn't get much industry research
• 1947 solar houses brochure

There were also traditional designs to make houses cooler, but they were increasing abandoned in a trend to more uniform architecture in tract houses

buyers were looking for space and equipment and didn't care about energy saving features, wanted very standard designs

Rise of air conditioning:

• home air conditioning became available at a reasonable price in the early 1950s
  
• by the early 1950s buyers began looking for better houses, not just the cheapest
• even in Houston buyers of low priced homes wanted space more than air conditioning (p. 67)
• by the late 1950s air conditioning was being marketed as healthier
• how does it change building design?
• you can save money on other things--eliminate the screened-in sleeping porch and attic fan
  

If you use electricity for air conditioning can you avoid having a separate system for heat?

• electricity companies pushed it because it helped balance the load
• offered discounts and incentives to builders
• the heat pump was invented in the 1940s but reversible heat pumps did not become common until the 1960s

Consumers were enjoying affluence
but there were also constraints on consumer choice