Today we live in an energy intensive built environment with the hope for a better quality of life. Architecture developed in this industrial age is highly dependant on mechanical controls resulting in high level of energy consumption. Buildings, as they are designed and used today, contribute to serious environmental problems because of excessive consumption of energy and other natural resources. The close connection between energy use in buildings and environmental damage arises because energy intensive solutions sought to construct a building and meet its demands for heating, cooling, ventilation, and lighting, which causes severe depletion of invaluable environmental resources.

Modern technologies are adopted without studying their suitability with regard to culture and climate. In the past, people built their houses in harmony with the environment as well as with optimal utilization of the available local building materials. The use of natural and passive means in traditional houses was very effective in providing a thermally comfortable space, which was warm in winter and cool in summer. This was the result due to repeated cycles of trial and error and the experience of generations of builders. The indigenous architecture evolved through the entire spectrum from individual building to settlement pattern, responds through form, thermal mass, spatial hierarchy, activity pattern, material and construction. An architectural heritage that survived for centuries because of geometric, technical and constructive principles that worked for the society, is being sadly destroyed under the guise of modernization. Traditional buildings are being abandoned, as it is perceived that they reflect underdevelopment and poverty.

The present study hypothises that the traditionally constructed and designed houses are considered to be more climate responsive as compared to the houses designed to modern constructional designs. The research methodology involves identification of various natural and passive design features that have been employed in the traditional residential buildings in old settlement of Lucknow. The research also involves the study of thermal performance through on-site monitoring of two traditional houses and one modern dwelling unit of Lucknow. Both quantitative and qualitative methods of gathering data were used. These included:

1. Recording of the physical form and construction systems of the buildings and settlements.

2. Recording the thermal performance in all the three buildings during the period of climatic extremes. The experiments were conducted during the third week of January 2004 and first week of June 2004. The temperature and relative humidity were measured outside the building and in different indoor spaces for every two hours for a complete one-day cycle for each building with the help of digital thermo hygrometer.

3. Comparative analysis of the thermal performance of the buildings.