I recommend that you find yourself in Washington, DC this October 9-13, 15-18 for the 4th Solar Decathlon.I am a Solar Decathlon Groupie. I love this stuff. I get a little giddy just talking about it. Gandolf and I have been to every one so far. We're there during construction, we tour the homes, we explain the technology to groups outside the homes, and we stop by during the break down.
I suppose I should stop and explain what I'm talking about.
Twenty colleges from around the country build a small home that fits in a set area and is completely solar powered. Then they transport the homes to DC and set them up down on the National Mall. They compete in 10 fields - Architecture, Market Viability, Engineering, Lighting Design, Communications, Comfort Zone, Hot Water, Appliances, Home Entertainment, and Net Metering. While they're here we get to tour the homes. Much of the work I've done on my house has been inspired by what I've seen at these shows.
Some schools get a small group of engineers to develop their house. Others expand the program across as many disciplines as possible. Some make it a two year class. Others make it an extracurricular program. Some sell their home after the show. Some turn it into student housing on campus. Some develop new technology for their home that they patent and try to find someone to manufacture and sell it.
Competing this year:
Cornell University
Iowa State University
Penn State
Rice University
Team Alberta (University of Calgary / SAIT Polytechnic / Alberta College of Art + Design / Mount Royal College)
Team Boston (Boston Architectural College / Tufts University)
Team California (Santa Clara University / California College of the Arts)
Team Missouri (Missouri University of Science and Technology / University of Missouri)
Team Ontario/BC (University of Waterloo / Ryerson University / Simon Fraser University)
Technische Universität Darmstadt
The Ohio State University
The University of Arizona
Universidad de Puerto Rico
Universidad Politécnica de Madrid
University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign
University of Kentucky
University of Louisiana at Lafayette
University of Minnesota
University of Wisconsin-Milwaukee
Virginia Tech
The main site is http://www.solardecathlon.org/.
More tomorrow.
In fact, you'll probably get sick of it soon.
2 comments:
I see my University isn't there, because there there is no sun!
These events are always cool though. Except when, because this is DC, they're hot even though it's October.
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