German Team Wins 2009 Solar Decathlon 56
An anonymous reader writes "Our team recently competed in the 2009 US Department of Energy Solar Decathlon. The Solar Decathlon is a 2-year competition that challenges university students from 20 US and international teams to design, build, and operate the most attractive and energy-efficient solar-powered house. Objective scores are based on comfort control, appliance performance, net-metering, and home entertainment. Subjective contest scores are determined by juries that weigh the engineering design, architectural design, as well as marketing and communication strategies. Team Germany took 1st place due to a large net production of electricity, while Team California claimed top honors in the Architecture contest. Minnesota won the engineering design section. However, looking beyond the contest winners, the main purpose of the event is to raise awareness about solar technology and sustainable design. As part of this campaign, products used in all 20 homes are listed on the DOE website. The most exciting aspect is that the construction and engineering documents and communication materials from all teams are open-sourced for anyone to use or modify!"
Re:solar (Score:5, Informative)
Photovoltaic maybe, but solar thermal is wholly ready now and efficient for the average home owner, especially evacuated tubes:
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Solar_thermal_collector#Evacuated_tube [wikipedia.org]
A few racks of those on the roof, when coupled with a passive haus, which can be built with 5% cost of a normal house, would probably cover a 95% of normal household's heating/hot_water needs with no major electric/natural_gas/oil backup required, even in the mild climates such as the north-east states:
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Passive_house [wikipedia.org]
Even in Canada, there seem to be projects revolving around that type of thing:
http://www.dlsc.ca/how.htm [www.dlsc.ca]
Photovoltaic is what, 15-30% at best? Solar Thermal can be up to 90% and evacuated tubes are pretty cheap now.
Re:Nice but (Score:4, Informative)
The pollution produced in the manufacturing of a solar panel is a one time cost. The pollution involved in producing & supplying a fossil fuel is an ongoing cost. All you have to do is use the solar panel for more than, say, a year, and you've already broken even in terms of pollution.
Obviously this is an oversimplification (not all forms of pollution are equal), but you get the idea.
Re:Hopefully ... (Score:5, Informative)
They did, it's called publication. Nothing that YOU can do will prevent the patent office awarding someone else a patent for something you created, but publishing provides strong evidence of prior art. Way to karma whore, though.
Re:Nice but (Score:1, Informative)
You ask, you'll get ananswer [oregon.gov]
Re:Where to find the open sourced docs ? (Score:4, Informative)
Go to the teams site e.g. http://www.solardecathlon.org/2009/team_germany.cfm [solardecathlon.org]
On the bottom right are the zip files. They contain the complete technical drawings.
What more do you want? If you want to build the exact same thing, you'll probably still need an architect. But hey, you also need a IT guy for installing bind.
Cool, on page 419 they describe how they moved the house from Darmstadt to Washington DC. So that's your blueprint for stealing it!
Congrats to the team! (Score:4, Informative)
Congrats to the team! What TFS doesn't say, is that TU Darmstadt won this competition for the 2nd time in a row.
Our research center was involved in the energy system design for the 2007 edition, but TU Darmstadt failed to mention it anywhere.
Nice to see that they achieved to win without screwing anyone this time!
Re:solar (Score:2, Informative)
Sure, right now photovoltaics are only 15-30% for system efficiency, thats system, not just the cells. But PV is not restrained by the Carnot efficiency because it is not a heat engine. More demand = more research = better cells. Just look at the space grade cells and PV concentrator cells. World record right now is about 43% efficient.
All serious contenders bought German equipment (Score:2, Informative)
I viewed these houses over four different days, from construction to display. .: Germany ... equipment.
Among the top contenders, some equipment was obviously German,
Bosch Dishwashers and German refrigerators for most every top contender.
Others viewing these solar houses often asked where to get some equipment on the top houses.
Solar cells: Germany
Heat exchanger: Germany
Kitchen equipment: Germay
. .
While some contest categories like architecture couldn't rely on German equipment,
this solar house contest seemed like the post WWII race for the best space program
-- who had the better German scientists, USSR or US with Werner von Braun.
Amongst these houses, who had the better German solar, heating, kitchen,
A couple years ago, Germany produced half the world's solar power.
While one can laud Germany, one must take note that the U.S. has bowed out of much science, technology, and the education of them (except biology, medicine, computers, and military equipment).
All the women and men on the German Team prodded the audience
and answered questions like engineers
-- a half Carribean, half German woman answered questions in contrasts
that signaled her engineering mind.
In contrast, the Virginia Tech team seemed lackadaisical
lounging around, ignorant about many aspects of their own house
-- was the Virginia Tech team just there to party?
In front of their TVs and computers, in their cars and trains,
with four times the population of Germany,
half the U.S. badmouths science and the striving for its knowledge (elitism).
Still, from wherever energy generation and usage technology comes, we are thankful.
The German house used phase-changing materials to dampen energy fluctuations,
a couple types of solar cells including some for shaded areas,
and was the only house with a second livable level.
Another house could electrically dim its windows.
The University of Illinois Urbana Champaign house sealed its doors like a commercial freezer.
One house changed one wall's colors according to cool or warm temperatures.
Thank you, scientists.