The biennial Solar Decathlon is coming up next month with teams preparing their solar-powered homes for West Potomac Park in Washington, D.C. The competition will showcase modern, energy-efficient homes from 19 teams from September 23 – October 2, 2011. We’ve taken a look at the architectural models for each home and continue our coverage this year with a look at the renderings. There’s some great work here. Any predictions? Which team will take it all?
Appalachian State University
The Solar Homestead — www.thesolarhomestead.com
Florida International University
perFORM[D]ance House — solardecathlon.fiu.edu
Middlebury College
Self-Reliance — solardecathlon.middlebury.edu
New Zealand: Victoria University of Wellington
First Light — www.firstlighthouse.ac.nz
The Ohio State University
enCORE — solardecathlon.osu.edu
Parsons and Stevens Institute of Technology
Empowerhouse — parsit.parsons.edu
Purdue University
INhome — www.purdue.edu/inhome/
SCI-Arc/Caltech
CHIP — www.chip2011.com
Team Belgium: Ghent University
E-Cube — www.solardecathlon.ugent.be
Canada: University of Calgary
Technological Residence, Traditional Living (TRTL) — www.solardecathlon.ca
Team China: Tongji University
Y Container — solardecathlon.tongji.edu.cn
Team Florida (USF, FSU, UCF, and UF)
Flex House — www.flexhouse.org
Team Massachusett (MassArt, Umass Lowell)
4D Home — www.4dhome.us
Team New Jersey (Rutgers, NJIT)
ENJOY House — www.solarteamnewjersey.com
Team New York (The City College of New York)
Solar Roofpod — www.ccnysolardecathlon.com
Tidewater Virginia (ODU, Hampton U)
Unit 6 Unplugged — www.teamtidewaterva.org
University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign
Re_home — www.solardecathlon.illinois.edu
University of Maryland
WaterShed — 2011.solarteam.org
The University of Tennessee
Living Light: UT Solar Decathlon House — www.livinglightutk.com
[+] Check out the Solar Decathlon 2011 models.
*University of Hawaii has withdrawn from competition.
Credits: U.S. Department of Energy Solar Decathlon.
These homes are all winners and I hope to see some of them offered for sale at some point in the future to the public; preferably in prefab form.
As a Michigan man, it pains me to say it but that Ohio State house is sharp.
There are some terrific designs illustrated here, I just wish some of them were sited within an urban or suburban fabric. That’s where they can have an immediate impact, particularly in disaster striken areas such as Joplin, MO.