It's almost impossible to read or watch the news today without seeing stories related to energy. At this time, questions about energy are taking on an increasingly more important major role in the national discussion. The most common question asked is: In a world where the subject of minimizing the use of energy becomes more critical, how can we as architects take advantage of our environment with no or minimal impact on it? How can we learn from the ancient and traditional architecture and use those methods in our design in order to minimize energy use? One answer is to use a passive systems...