ReForm Team One Step Closer to Victory

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.