Effects of Current Sunlight Exposure Regulations on New Housing

Abstract

Building new living spaces is one of the most profitable and emergent industry in Romania, the European country with the greatest percent of private apartments. This is (still) a consequence of a former restrictive political regime (the communism) regarding the national housing politics with its standard prefabricated living units arranged in closed patterns. The political changes that followed 1989 meant also specific legal regulations in the construction field, concerning all aspects needed to have more comfortable buildings, especially for living. Main aspects such as land occupancy percentage and usage coefficient, adaptability for people with disabilities and elevators, orientation, sunlight, green and parking spaces are treated in different legal acts, sometimes contradictory. One of the most difficult acts to follow, especially in the narrow urban spaces, is the latest Order from Ministry of Health (no. 119 from 2014), regarding public health standards for the living environment of the population. This norm defines that any new building should ensure at least 1 hours direct sunlight (through exterior windows) during the winter solstice for all bedrooms and living rooms of the new building as well as for all the neighbouring ones. Above this, if the distance between the neighbouring buildings is smaller than the height of the tallest one, a sunlight study must be done to prove that the required direct sunlight is possible. This paper aims to show that these specific restrictions will have a major impact on new urban living spaces in the near future. There are lots of situations given by site conditions or neighbouring buildings in which planners of new constructions will not be allowed to place living spaces on two or three facades (those from the North and partially from the East and West). This is a challenging limitation for urban planners and architects, especially given the new climatic environment, which makes southern bedrooms quite uncomfortable during summer. By studying some examples from Romania that respect this controversial article, compared with other European cities with an emerging housing industry, the scope of this study is to find solutions both comfortable and urban possible.