True, but the same could be said for decently designed and built houses customized for the environment it's in. Go down the average residential street nearly anywhere in the USA and you are likely to see the same designs for homes built in the same decade despite a huge range in weather/temps.
Sad thing it's not particularly hard to make a radically more efficient home. One that will pay off many times over during the life of the house. However it costs the builder more, and saves money for the buyer. That disconnect means houses are built as cheap as zoning allows.
I've seen houses designed for below freezing weather that can be heated with 100 watts! The tricks weren't particularly expensive. Great insulation (of course), which of course can cause stale air and even unhealthy air. But then they engineered in the healthy amount of air from outside, but then had a energy recovery system where the exhausted air would heat/cool the incoming air so you could get a high flow with minimal energy losses. It's getting to the point where resistive heat, the crudest of heaters, is used despite being 3-4x less efficient than a heat pump. But the house is so efficient that the electricity used is minimal.
So no need to move 100 tons of rock, worry about leaks, safety issues, put up with worse windows/lighting, and where to put the 100 tons of rock, etc. Just use more insulation and a bit of smarts on energy efficient air handling.
Sad thing it's not particularly hard to make a radically more efficient home. One that will pay off many times over during the life of the house. However it costs the builder more, and saves money for the buyer. That disconnect means houses are built as cheap as zoning allows.
I've seen houses designed for below freezing weather that can be heated with 100 watts! The tricks weren't particularly expensive. Great insulation (of course), which of course can cause stale air and even unhealthy air. But then they engineered in the healthy amount of air from outside, but then had a energy recovery system where the exhausted air would heat/cool the incoming air so you could get a high flow with minimal energy losses. It's getting to the point where resistive heat, the crudest of heaters, is used despite being 3-4x less efficient than a heat pump. But the house is so efficient that the electricity used is minimal.
So no need to move 100 tons of rock, worry about leaks, safety issues, put up with worse windows/lighting, and where to put the 100 tons of rock, etc. Just use more insulation and a bit of smarts on energy efficient air handling.