"Jen" wrote in message
...

"Chookie" wrote in message
...
In article ,
"Jen" wrote:

But summer is generally 'very' hot, with the occasional snow, flooding
and
many very cold days. And winter is generally 'very' cold with snow etc,
but
occasionally has warm days.

You might be surprised -- the average summer temp in Sydney is only about
26
C; probably a bit hotter where I am. That's not "very" hot, though we do
of
course have heatwaves. And unless you are in Antarctica, your winters
are NOT
very cold. I'd be surprised if you got -10 C very often.

Contrast Moscow, where it can get to 40 C in summer and -40 C in winter!

I can understand building houses to suit hot
climates, or very cold climates, but Australia has both. What about
central
Australia, they have super hot days, but super cold nights.

You design for where you live, not for a mythical average across our
enormous
country!


I live in Victoria. This summer we've had many above 40 days, but we've
also had snow. Where I live there's often snow in the winter 1/2 hour
away, and occasionally here. But it can still be steaming hot, or dry, or
cold and snowing even in summer. I'm not talking average across country
here!

a well-insulated construction doesn't suffer vagaries of heat & cold so
much, it's stable & minimises that problem for the most part. of course,
summer & winter indoor temperatures are going to vary a bit - that's life.
it's really not the point what weird weather events might happen
unexpectedly - you plan for stability, and according to sun access in winter
& keeping it out in summer, etc. if you have windows in the right places etc
with the right fixtures for your climate you can control indoor temps quite
easily (regardless of how otherwise "good" the house is). and so on.
kylie