Sustainability Plan - University of Washington Tacoma

Sustainability
Step 1: Analyzing the Climate
The Tacoma climate has mild, relatively dry
summers and cool, wet winters. The tables
and charts that follow summarize this climate.
Additional climate information can be found in
Appendix D.
Enough rain falls in Tacoma that UW Tacoma
can reuse the the rainfall that lands there. The
solar and wind resources of the site can be used
for reducing the energy use in buildings both
passively (daylighting, passive heating, etc.) and
actively (solar water heating, photovoltaics, wind
power, etc).
Tacoma, WA
Notes
Latitude 47.15 Long summer and short winter daylight hours
Longitude 122.25
Elevation ~150
Summer Outside Design Temp.
(0.4% data)
86F
Relatively low summer design temperature
Dry Bulb and Mean Coincident Wet
Bulb (F)
66F
Winter Outside Design Temp.
20
(99.6%)
Summer Diurnal Temp Range 23
This value is the difference between the daytime
high temp and the nighttime low temp. A high
diurnal range like this is good for natural ventilation
and night flushing to reduce the building’s summer
AC load.
Cooling Degree days, 65F base 136 Very low
Cooling Degree days, 55F base 1,088 Less than the UW Seattle campus (1,214)
Heating Degree days, 65F base 4,799 Less than the UW Seattle campus (4,468)
Solar Radiation (kbtu/sf/yr) 415 Relatively low
Annual Precipitation 39 degrees Good for rainwater reclamation
Average Wind Speed (mph) 8 Potential for a small amount of on-site wind power
Figure 2.9 | Tacoma Climate Summary
Spring 2009
University of Washington Tacoma - Infrastructure Master Plan
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