Interest is growing throughout California and the United States in new homes designed to provide comfortable living environments with lower energy consumption and operating costs. Residential design focused on proper orientation, optimized building envelope, effective heating, cooling, and lighting systems, as well as efficient appliance selections, significantly reduce home energy use. Adding solar energy systems to generate electricity by harvesting the sun's rays, or solar thermal systems to heat water or air by capturing solar heat gain, further offset energy consumption and lower a home's carbon footprint on the environment.

Designing, building, and living in high-performance homes provides economic, quality-of-living, and environmental advantages for homeowners. Home builders enjoy increased appeal by constructing new homes that have improved thermal comfort and lower operating costs. Utility companies also realize benefits because high-performance homes, and those with solar energy and thermal systems, reduce both peak energy demand and consumption on the system-wide electrical grid. This Design Brief provides an introduction for designing highperformance new homes by addressing the following topics:

• Benefits and Incentives
• Integrated Designs
• Solar Technologies
• Energy-efficient Equipment