Kevin Brosnahan of the DOE estimated that over 100,000 people showed up to visit this year's Solar Decathlon, a testament to the public's growing interest in all things green. Saturday, the final day for house tours, the crowd was thick, and the lines - especially at winners' houses - longer than ever.
Luckily for everyone, the weather was beautiful. Saturday night UC's [re]form team began deconstruction of the house. I think everyone agrees that our team worked extremely hard on this house, and established UC as a world-class university that is absolutely dedicated to furthering itself innovatively and collaboratively. As Nancy Zimpher said Friday night, "This is what UC 21 is about."
UC's Journalism team was extremely lucky to have had the opportunity to go and report on something like the Solar Decathlon. We had our challenges, but overall I think we would do it again in a heartbeat.
Thanks, Elissa.
By: Emily | Tuesday, October 23, 2007 at 9:12 AM | |
The crowds of visitors and guests in the Solar Village are still lining up to catch a glimpse of the future. There's anticipation and speculation in the air as we get closer to the final results when the winner of this year's competition will be announced.
By: Terron | Friday, October 19, 2007 at 7:49 PM | |
Last night, UC's [re]form team served a (very low-lit) dinner to team members from Texas, Maryland and Cornell, one of the last elements of the competition to take place.
Today at 2 pm the winners of the Engineering contest will be announced, followed by the announcement of the overall winner of the 2007 Solar Decathlon. There is plenty of speculation right now, with Maryland and Darmstadt going head to head for the win - right now they're about one point apart, a minuscule difference - but the Engineering contest could result in a surprise for everyone. We'll see you on the flip side!
Well, yesterday the winner of the architecture competition was announced: Technische Universität Darmstadt! The team, pictured above, was very gracious and called all the houses "beautiful" and deserving of an award.
Today the winner of the communications contest was revealed to be the University of Maryland, which is currently in the lead all around with 98.2 out of 100 points for their "leaf house."
By: Emily | Tuesday, October 16, 2007 at 4:05 PM | |
The ReForm team taking a breather after a long day of anxious visitors and solar house tours. InForm team member and photojournalist Emily Schneider steps out from behind the camera to chat with the team during a much needed break.
By: Terron | Monday, October 15, 2007 at 10:49 AM | |
The system overview console located on the kitchen wall that controls everything in the house. Lights, heating and air conditioning-all at the touch of the screen. You hold the power in your hands!
By: Terron | Sunday, October 14, 2007 at 10:46 AM | |
The master bedroom and its shagadelic rug. Very Austin Powers, huh? Doesn't it look like someone forgot to shake out the wrinkles in the comforter set? :-)
Guests take a moment to learn about the solar and thermal energy techniques used to heat and cool the house in each season and generate electricity inside.
Comfy, chic and contemporary accents in this quiet corner of the living room. Perfect for curling up with a good book or a copy of The Washington Post.
More details and explanations about the kitchen from the team. Check out the brilliant use of storage and appliance space underneath the island countertop.
The ReForm team woke up this morning with six days left and smiles on their faces in preparation for the juries to come for a contest inspection of their houses. Close to 8:00 a.m. right after breakfast, the first set of three jurors came strolling up the ramp to critique the team on its architectural advances. Out of the ten contests, each team is required to design and build an attractive home utilizing solar and energy efficient techniques all incorporated in the home’s overall design. Each team can earn up to 200 point in this contest category, the most crucial one holding the most value among the other categories. ReForm team member and architecture grad student Nick Germann stopped to talk to our reporters about the morning’s judicial encounter.
“They were bland, but they gave a whole lot of feedback,” said Germann. “Hey, it was still early. I guess they were still asleep.” Keeping an open mind and sense of humor has been one of the major factors of keeping the team together in the heat of the moment according to Germann and his design teammates. Carl Sterner, another UC grad student studying architecture, stood at the top of the ramp to explain his feelings on today’s juries.
“Those jurors saw our exhibit and loved it, we really worked the exhibit design,” said Sterner “Most others use the batch mentality by escorting groups and all they end up getting is a quick view all at once, but generally the same information.”
Another teammate and interior design student, Tina Sevilla chimed in on this morning’s visitation from the jurors and her feelings on what they experience while there.
“They seemed really impressed,” said Sevilla. “The jurors loved the amount of natural lighting in the house. They also loved our rain screen. In fact, everyone who has come to see the house comes to see that screen.”
Next up, the jurors for the category of communication were introduced to a consistently impressive way of introducing certain aspects of the solar home. Sterner was on site again for this and gave us his thoughts later this afternoon.
“They loved our strategy,” said Sterner. “Then we were able to take them through one at a time to absorb it all in then allow each could ask questions.”
Sevilla caught a few jurors admiring the evacuated tubing set up and more.
“Those tubes kinda got us through it today,” said Sevilla. “People asked a lot about the evacuated tubing and actually powering the house.” Sevilla says the photovoltaic (PV) panels on the roof create the solar home’s electricity, but most of the home itself relies on produced and converted thermal energy. Apparently, a marketing question came from the marketing viability jurors surrounding the manufacturers of the tubing. The answer was Sunda, a Chinese company which currently leads technology in the solar thermal field.
Stay tuned for more from Washington, D.C. as we continue gaining ground in the 2007 Solar Decathlon.
Judging took place today in three areas: architecture, market viability and communication. I was lucky enough to be present for the communication judging, and we seemed to do really well! (Don't tell, but I peeked at one judge's notes, and they were really positive!) It was interesting trying to explain the absorption chiller to them, but difficult to do well in the 20 minutes we had. Overall, though, the experience was a great one, and our exhibitry obviously impressed them. Here are some photos from yesterday (I'll upload today's later).
Team members relax once tour hours are over.
The kitchen has a nifty touch-powered control screen to moniter the systems of the house.
The facade yesterday afternoon.
By: Emily | Saturday, October 13, 2007 at 10:37 AM | |
It’s almost time to begin judging the entries in this year’s Solar Decathlon, but the ReForm team’s spirits are even higher than the temperature here in our nation’s capital. Amid 64 degree weather, plenty of sun, and a chilling breeze, the team delighted in explaining the details of their competition entry to the hundreds of passers by clad in light jackets, sweaters, wool ponchos and shades visiting each spectacular solar house on the National Mall earlier Friday afternoon.
After scoping the scene to get a feel for the team’s energy level and their ideas of their current place in the competition, the team generally felt they were in good standing. According to competition entry regulations, Decathlon houses were to cease construction on Friday morning. UC’s ReForm team finished ahead of the rest in the crisp evening after hours on Thursday around 2:00 a.m. leaving about 10 of their opponents in the dust to scramble completing cosmetic changes to their houses. Some were even applying a few last minute coats of paint well into the afternoon. Jonathan Herman, a graduate architecture student, spoke of the team’s experiences working to get to this final leg of the competition and a few lessons he’s learned along the way.
“The greatest lesson was simply learning how to go about building things,” said Herman. Like other architecture students who had the most to say about the team’s effort and structure, Herman acknowledged what could’ve been a dilemma from the start.
“Working with the engineering students has been fun. We have different mindsets. They’re about getting it done, doing it the standard way the way the industry does.” But separate mentalities didn’t slow the team down; it actually made them stronger.
“We (architecture students) have had to fight our ground. We think of how it can not only be the best, but how it can look its best, too. We all still had fun coming together.” Herman and his fellow teammates now appreciate even more the differences that have helped them create a finished product they can now be proud of.
Hopefully one of their most distinctive features proves to be a goldmine for the team. The 120 evacuated tubes serving as solar thermal collectors forming the outer wall of the house’s courtyard is the largest number of tubes for any past or present Decathlon entry. This puts them a step above the rest once again just on the premise of doing something a little different in the competition. The team undergoes architecture, marketing appeal, and communications judging beginning tomorrow and Sunday promptly at 10:00 a.m. so we’ll see if all these positive vibes start to pay off soon. Stay tuned for more from Washington, D.C. as we bring you the exclusives from the 2007 Solar Decathlon.
By: Terron | Friday, October 12, 2007 at 11:39 PM | |
Beyond their Germanness and shiny corduroys, the Darmstadt team seemed a little foreign at the 2007 Solar Decathlon. Conceptually and geographically, their approach to the solar home they constructed seemed removed from other entries.
The Darmstadt team's motto was ostensibly the same as the Cincinnati Yellow Pages: Work Smart, not Hard. Thomas Köhler, the architecture student that designed the dwelling, decided that the house should be a "passive structure," meaning that either side of the house is donned with glass doors, The purpose behind this design is almost entirely for ventilation purposes: if the house is too warm, open the doors for a delightful breeze: if too cold, shut those doors and the sun filtered in through the doors will heat the house.
"Our first concept was to save energy and not produce a lot of energy," said Köhler.
In addition, the Darmstadt house has a paraffin ceiling. As the house is warmed, the paraffin melts, releasing energy so as not to trap in too much heat. As the house cools, the paraffin harden to trap the remaining heat.
As we all know, Germans are the best at everything and are quite possibly the coolest people in existence. As such, the Darmstadt team had the most unique and potentially marketable innovation in the house. In conjunction with the movable photovoltaic panels attached to their roof, the Darmstadt team itself custom designed and built their own PV panels for the front of the structure. They combined the panels inside a wooden trellis that bordered the south side of the house, created almost a venetian blind feeling.
Also, the team had installed invisible, surrounds sound speakers INSIDE (nestled in between slats) the drywall!
Köhler and the rest of the Darmstadt team were eager to participate in the competition surprisingly because Germany typically never hosts these kinds of events. "If you study [architecture], you usually just plan, but [only] theoretical, nothing practical," said Köhler, his beautiful teeth glistening in the sunshine's wake.
"It's really interesting for us to see 20 different types of houses which are thinking in different ways to deal with energy," said Köhler.
By: Ryan | Wednesday, October 10, 2007 at 9:06 AM | |
On Friday Oct. 5th, there were only 19 solar powered homes present on the National Mall at the 2007 Solar Decathlon. Santa Clara University's solar home had fallen off the back of their truck in California en route to the event. Axles on their carrier truck had cracked from pressure on a steep grade causing their house to slide off.
Luckily, around 7 pm that night, a new carrier gingerly drove Santa Clara's home on the site with no significant damage. "Our house actually made it in really good condition so we don't have a lot to worry about," said Brian Brocco, electrical engineering student. Even with such a huge setback, Santa Clara was nearly equidistant with others teams a day after getting their home on site.
What may have saved Santa Clara University from complete disaster? Planning. While many others teams were adjusting electrical and plumbing systems on site, Santa Clara had the forethought to install and adjust those systems while back in California.
Other factors in this competition posed problems for the team from the start. They were the 21st team selected at the start on the competition, and not eligible to compete unless another team dropped out. A neighboring school California Polytechnic State University in San Luis Obispo, a contestant in the 2005 Solar Decathlon, did withdraw, allowing Santa Clara the 20th slot.
Others problems surfaced for the team:"Santa Clara University is really one of the smaller schools here," said Brocco. "We don't even have an architecture school." Cal Poly actually assisted the team in creating a design for the house, passing on a few floor plan designs after they withdrew from the competition.
It will be interesting to see how this small Silicon Valley school fares in the weeks to come.
By: Ryan | Tuesday, October 9, 2007 at 7:41 AM | |
the inform team would like to thank: Apple: for making the 12" powerbook that is pretty light Volkswagen: for our Jetta that gets great mileage the Department of Energy: for hosting the solar decathlon Chrome: for making nice messenger bags that don't hurt our shoulders and the D.C. metro system for getting us all around this 100 sq. mile town
By: Zach Breedlove | Sunday, October 7, 2007 at 1:37 AM | |
Today, we took a much needed break to visit the National Zoo in Washington to sneak a glimpse of their Pandas. Sorry for the terrible photo, our camera charger was left in Ohio, and the Pandas were a few hundred miles away.
As mentioned below, we also chatted with the lead architect for the German team. The story is to follow.
And here is a photo of the village from the roof of the Smithsonian, courtesy of the DOE.
The amount of work being done in the solar village this week has been tremendous. As with any event of this magnitude, there are great stories to tell, and we will be bringing them to you over the next few days. The lead story from the national mall in Washington has been the team from Santa Clara University. They had the longest voyage for any domestic team, and had been sitting on the sidelines until Friday evening when their house finally arrived. One of the six axles on their semi trailer broke in Nebraska, delaying the delivery of their house. As the other teams progressed with their construction, Santa Clara was receiving news that their house was back on the road in O-H-I-O, and finally on the way after roadside welding to the broken axle. In Saturday's team meeting, all of the teams offered a team member to the Santa Clara group so they could finish on time. Santa Clara graciously declined, feeling that they could complete construction with the team they brought. The solar decathlon may very well be the only competition where other teams offer their members to help another team. That shows that the solar decathlon is about more than winning. The participants feel so strongly about sustainability and alternative energy sources that they are willing to hurt their own team to help another team in need. Inform will be bringing you more on the Santa Clara team, including an in-depth story; as well as information about the Darmstadt team from the Deutschland tomorrow.
UC's first Solar Decathlon house is stacked up against some pretty stiff competition. Here are a few pics. Interviews with some of the competing teams to come later. For now, it's some much needed rest for the inform team.
By: Zach Breedlove | Thursday, October 4, 2007 at 11:49 PM | |
After a full day (5a-3p), the inform team has arrived in Washington, D.C. for the Solar Decathlon competition. So far, there are a lot of bees (which might be simply because we're blogging from the Smithsonian garden).
Well, after a lot of this:
in this:
we got here:
The site is looking good, and according to Anton Harfmann, re-construction is already ahead of schedule on day two.
Keep it locked here for multiple daily updates over the next week.
The reForm team is getting ready to begin working on reconstruction when time opens up at midnight this evening. Also, be sure to check the team website for video and photo updates of reconstruction.
By: Zach Breedlove | Tuesday, October 2, 2007 at 2:08 PM | |
Well, as of Friday the house is in Washington, DC and being prepared for final judgment - a rather stressful but altogether exciting prospect. I just wanted to share one of the final images I shot before it left - Eric Stear drilling in the last panels of [re]form's ceiling. Wish us luck!
