Earth-Sheltered Buildings

Earth-sheltered buildings offer an important alternative to conventionally designed facilities. This design manual provides criteria for evaluating the habitability and suitability of earth-sheltered space as well as providing new technical design information.
Design guidance is presented for use by experienced engineers and architects. The types of buildings within the scope of this manual include slab-on-grade, partially-buried (bermed) or fully-buried, and large (single-story or multistory) structures. New criteria unique to earth-sheltered design are included for the following disciplines: Planning, Landscape Design, Life-Cycle Analysis, Architectural, Structural, Mechanical (criteria include below-grade heat flux calculation procedures), and Electrical.