Reading Sun Path Diagrams

Sun path diagrams can tell you a lot about how the sun will impact your site
and building throughout the year. Stereographic sun path diagrams can be
used to read the solar azimuth and altitude for a given location.
How to read Sunpath
Diagrams
At 9am...
on April 1...
the azimuth is 62o
the altitude is 30o

Stereographic Sun Path Diagrams

Stereographic sun path diagrams are used to read the solar azimuth and altitude throughout the
day and year for a given position on the earth. They can be likened to a photograph of the sky,
taken looking straight up towards the zenith, with a 180 fish-eye lens. The paths of the sun at
different times of the year can then be projected onto this flattened hemisphere for any location
on Earth.
Note that these stereographic diagrams are not exactly like a fish-eye photo: such an image
would be flipped left-to-right. These diagrams are from the point of view of the sky looking
down at the ground, you can superimpose it on a map or a plan of the building without being
confused. (You can see this by following the hour lines from east to west on the diagram.)

Azimuth Lines - Azimuth angles run around the edge of the diagram.
Altitude Lines - Altitude angles are represented as concentric circular dotted lines that run from
the center of the diagram out.
Date Lines - Date lines start on the eastern side of the graph and run to the western side and
represent the path of the sun on one particular day of the year. In Ecotect, the first day of January
to June are shown as solid lines, while July to December are shown as dotted lines.
Hour Lines/ Analemma - Hour lines are shown as figure-eight-type lines that intersect the date
lines and represent the position of the sun at a specific hour of the day. The intersection points
between date and hour lines give the position of the sun.

Reading the Sun

Position (Step-byStep)
1. Locate the required hour
line on the diagram.
2. Locate the required date
line, remembering that solid
are used for Jan-June and
dotted lines for July-Dec.
3. Find the intersection point
of the hour and date lines.
Remember to intersect solid
with solid and dotted with
dotted lines.
4. Draw a line from the very
center of the diagram,
through the intersection
point, out to the perimeter
of the diagram.

Annotated stereographic sun path diagram.

5. Read the azimuth as an angle taken clockwise from north. In this case, the value is about 62.
6. Trace a concentric circle around from the intersection point to the vertical north axis, on which is
displayed the altitude angles.
7. Interpolate between the concentric circle lines to find the altitude. In this case the intersection
point sits exactly on the 30 line.
8. This gives the position of the sun, fully defined as an azimuth and altitude.

Sun charts illustrating the variation in the suns movement in relation to latitude.

More information on sun path diagrams, including other graphical forms like Cylindrical
Diagrams, can be found on the Ecotect Natural Frequency Wiki.
Sun Path Projections
Reading Sun Positions
The articles on passive heating, cooling, and daylighting will describe how to design for bringing
the sun's heat and light into the building at some times and keeping it out at other times.