Filed under: Home, Alternative Energy

University of Kentucky Uses Innovative Recycled Plastic Decking at the Solar Decathlon from Plastics Make it Possible on Vimeo.

Last month students from around the world gathered on the National Mall in Washington D.C. to compete in the Solar Decathlon, hosted by the U.S. Department of Energy.

Twenty teams designed, built and operated solar-powered homes, which were then opened to the public, both to get votes, and to educate people about the latest uses of energy-efficient building practices and materials.

The first, and hardest, part of the competition actually happens before they get to D.C., when the teams design their structures, raise money to build them, and supervise contractors to actually raise them. Then they take them apart — very carefully! — and transport them to the National Mall, where they are reassembled on site. The final phase includes the judging, where they are evaluated on 10 different areas:

• Architecture – 100 points
• Market Viability – 100 points
• Engineering – 100 points
• Lighting Design – 75 points
• Communications – 75 points
• Comfort Zone – 100 points
• Hot Water – 100 points
• Appliances – 100 points
• Home Entertainment – 100 points
• Net Metering – 150 points

The D.O.E. has several goals for the competition, including educating students about alternative energy solutions, raising public awareness, and stimulating R&D of innovative new technologies.

This year the winners included 2007 champions Team Germany (Technische Universität Darmstadt) in first place, with a home that had photovoltaic panels on every available surface.

In second place was the University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign, with a home that combined traditional building techniques with energy efficient technologies.

Third place was awarded to Team California (Santa Clara University, California College of the Arts), with a house that won first place in the Architecture and Communications contests.

All of the entries are pretty inspiring, and offer a great example for anyone considering some home improvements of their own!

The Solar Decathlon originally appeared on Green Daily on Tue, 03 Nov 2009 12:00:00 EST . Please see our terms for use of feeds.

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Filed under: Alternative Energy

2008 may have been the year that solar power started popping up in more places than your calculator.

The Solar Energy Industries Association announced in a report today that solar energy capacity increased by 17 percent last year. Government stimulus programs have helped get that growth rate and this year’s stimulus package has a bunch of provisions for getting solar power closer to the main stream.

And the not-so-good news? While the survey said that 2008 was a great year, 2009 may be a different story. The global meltdown hit the industry pretty hard in the first quarter. The financial crisis has dried up a lot of financing for an industry that requires a lot of cash (getting power from photovoltaic panels costs three times as much as wind-generated energy).

So, what’s going to boost the solar industry? The solar folks are looking for federal policies that would mandate a percentage of US energy come from renewable power. They also want a “solar carve-out” policy that would ensure a certain percentage of renewable energy come from sun power. Similar requirements have already been implemented in a dozen individual states but the industry is looking for federal policies to really get solar going.

Solar Power Gets Brighter in 2008 originally appeared on Green Daily on Thu, 19 Mar 2009 15:00:00 EST . Please see our terms for use of feeds.

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