Sincere congratulations to everyone from Team California.
The Refract House project from SCU+CCA took 3rd place overall! Richard King, Director of the Solar Decathlon, said the team thought "outside the box" when announcing the awards. The teams' creativity and hard work paid off!
•Architecture – 1st place
•Communications – 1st place
•Engineering – 2nd place
•Appliances – 2nd place
•Home Entertainment – 2nd place
•Hot Water – 3rd place
•Market Viability – 3rd place
•Lighting Design – 6th place
•Net metering – 12th place
•Comfort Zone – 14th place
For more details:
www.cca.edu/about/press/2009/cca-and-scu-team-california-win-3rd-place-solar-decathlon
www.scu.edu/news/?b=208&c=5811
http://www.refracthouse.com/
www.facebook.com/people/refract-house/100000001534042
www.twitter.com/refracthouse
http://www.solardecathlon.org/
http://www.scu.edu/
http://www.cca.edu/
Ideate is proud to have provided Autodesk Revit training and courseware to the students - the tools the team used to develop the “excellent drawings” cited when the First in Architecture was awarded.
Showing posts with label Refract House. Show all posts
Showing posts with label Refract House. Show all posts
October 16, 2009
October 15, 2009
Latest Updates on the Solar Decathlon
For all the latest updates from Washington, D.C., check out the Solar Decathlon Blog:
http://www.refracthouse.com
or follow Refract House on Twitter:
http://twitter.com/Refracthouse
Why is Ideate following Team California's Refract House entry so closely? Well, we are proud to be a Megawatt sponsor and been instrumental early in the project, providing the Autodesk Revit training and courseware that the team used to develop the “excellent drawings” cited when the First in Architecture was awarded.
Go Team California!
http://www.refracthouse.com
or follow Refract House on Twitter:
http://twitter.com/Refracthouse
Why is Ideate following Team California's Refract House entry so closely? Well, we are proud to be a Megawatt sponsor and been instrumental early in the project, providing the Autodesk Revit training and courseware that the team used to develop the “excellent drawings” cited when the First in Architecture was awarded.
Go Team California!
October 8, 2009
The Solar Decathlon Begins Today!
More great updates from Washington, D.C.
The Solar Decathlon begins today!
After two years of planning, designing, engineering, and building, our SCU+CCA Team California is ready to welcome the world through the doors of Refract House on the National Mall in Washington, D.C.! Team California was one of only 9 teams (of the 20 participants) to pass all inspections in order to be eligible to begin competing today. More great news: Student Project Manager Allison Kopf (SCU ’11) has the honor of joining Energy Secretary Steven Chu to address the crowd at the Opening Ceremonies. And, as if that were not enough, SCU and CCA students were thrilled to learn that CBS will be interviewing Secretary Chu for its news program 60 Minutes (which boasts more than 9 million viewers!) in OUR SOLAR HOUSE this morning! We will post the air date and more information soon. Our student team is making us proud—working around the clock on getting the house ready for competition and visitors, talking with media, and preparing for the blitz that is the Solar Decathlon.
Sure to be a topic of buzz on the National Mall, one of the innovations being introduced in our 2009 entry is a carbon meter. Thanks to a grant from the California Energy Commission, Santa Clara University has been working with SolarTech (a PV industry consortium) to develop this concept. Over the past year, it has been developed and tested on SCU's campus on our 2007 Solar Decathlon entry, Ripple House. With great results being achieved, students were excited to install the meter on Refract House to measure carbon offsets at real-time rates. In the future, it is expected this type of monitoring will allow homeowners to be compensated for saving energy while contributing to the health of the planet, enabling a potential economy of carbon cap and trade.
News Flash: On October 9, 5-6 p.m. EST, student team members will be available on facebook and gchat (refracthouse) to answer your questions. They are looking forward to hearing from you!
Keep track of the overall standings here.
Watch this fun video from The Washington Post showing our SCU and California flags waving, and our student, Preet Anand (SCU ’10) getting the last word! More on our team in the Santa Cruz Sentinel. A great photo of our team with Secretary Chu here: cnet news and an interview with NPR.
Heidi Williams
Communications Manager
School of Engineering
Santa Clara University
www.scu.edu/engineering
The Solar Decathlon begins today!
After two years of planning, designing, engineering, and building, our SCU+CCA Team California is ready to welcome the world through the doors of Refract House on the National Mall in Washington, D.C.! Team California was one of only 9 teams (of the 20 participants) to pass all inspections in order to be eligible to begin competing today. More great news: Student Project Manager Allison Kopf (SCU ’11) has the honor of joining Energy Secretary Steven Chu to address the crowd at the Opening Ceremonies. And, as if that were not enough, SCU and CCA students were thrilled to learn that CBS will be interviewing Secretary Chu for its news program 60 Minutes (which boasts more than 9 million viewers!) in OUR SOLAR HOUSE this morning! We will post the air date and more information soon. Our student team is making us proud—working around the clock on getting the house ready for competition and visitors, talking with media, and preparing for the blitz that is the Solar Decathlon.
Sure to be a topic of buzz on the National Mall, one of the innovations being introduced in our 2009 entry is a carbon meter. Thanks to a grant from the California Energy Commission, Santa Clara University has been working with SolarTech (a PV industry consortium) to develop this concept. Over the past year, it has been developed and tested on SCU's campus on our 2007 Solar Decathlon entry, Ripple House. With great results being achieved, students were excited to install the meter on Refract House to measure carbon offsets at real-time rates. In the future, it is expected this type of monitoring will allow homeowners to be compensated for saving energy while contributing to the health of the planet, enabling a potential economy of carbon cap and trade.
News Flash: On October 9, 5-6 p.m. EST, student team members will be available on facebook and gchat (refracthouse) to answer your questions. They are looking forward to hearing from you!
Keep track of the overall standings here.
Watch this fun video from The Washington Post showing our SCU and California flags waving, and our student, Preet Anand (SCU ’10) getting the last word! More on our team in the Santa Cruz Sentinel. A great photo of our team with Secretary Chu here: cnet news and an interview with NPR.
Heidi Williams
Communications Manager
School of Engineering
Santa Clara University
www.scu.edu/engineering
October 6, 2009
Team California's Completion of Refract House
Here's today's update regarding Team California's (Santa Clara University+California College of Arts) completion of the Refract House for the U.S. Department of Energy's 2009 Solar Decathlon.
The countdown has begun! Our 800-square-foot solar-powered house is now being reassembled on the National Mall in Washington D.C., and our team is working feverishly to make us proud at this prestigious competition. As you know, our students are competing against 19 other teams from universities and colleges in the U.S., Canada, Germany, Puerto Rico, and Spain.
Following is a brief update on our Team's progress in D.C.
Refract House made history yesterday as it was "the first Solar Decathlon house ever to be connected with a microgrid." Richard King, Solar Decathlon Director, writes all about it in his daily journal on the official Website for the Solar Decathlon. He also notes, "Inspection Officer Tom Meyers believes the work being done by the student teams is about 10 years ahead of what is used by today's architects, engineers, and contractors," and lists as an example SCU's own bamboo structural I-joists that feature an open-web design to ease construction. Similar to the bamboo I-beams developed for SCU's 3rd place winning 2007 entry, these trestle-shaped beams have been altered to allow ducting, electrical wiring, and plumbing to run through while maintaining structural support.
At the opening ceremonies on Thursday, October 8, SCU student project manager Allison Kopf '11 will be one of only two students selected to address the crowd along with Energy Secretary Stephen Chu.
Keep up with all the Solar Decathlon news on these blogs:
School of Engineering Solar Decathlon Blog http://www.scu.edu/engineering/solardecathlon/blog.cfm
Refract House Website
http://www.refracthouse.com/
Richard King’s Daily Journal http://www.solardecathlon.org/2009/daily_journals.cfm
October 8: Opening Ceremonies, 1-2 p.m. Team California Student Project Manager Allison Kopf (SCU '11) is one of two students selected to deliver the welcoming address!
October 9-13 and 15-18: Public Tours. Team houses are open 11 a.m. - 3 p.m. Monday - Friday and 10 a.m. - 5 p.m. Saturdays and Sundays. There is no cost to attend the Solar Decathlon, and you do not need to register in advance. ALL HOUSES ARE CLOSED WED., OCT. 14. Some houses may be closed 1-2 hours on other days for competition judging and measurement purposes. http://www.solardecathlon.org/schedule.cfm
October 16: Awards Ceremony, 10 - 11 a.m.
Thank you, thank you, thank you for your encouragement, your support, and your confidence in our Team!
Heidi Williams
Communications Manager
School of Engineering
Santa Clara University
www.scu.edu/engineering
Ideate is so pleased to have provided Revit training to these creative students!
September 28, 2009
Ideate Sponsors Refract House Solar Decathlon Team
Did you know that Ideate, Inc. is a Bronze Level sponsor of Refract House?
The Refract House team is collaboration of Santa Clara University and California College of the Arts in their bid to win the U.S. Department of Energy’s 2009 Solar Decathlon. Refract House is one of the 20 university-led teams selected from around the globe to compete in the DOE's fourth Solar Decathlon. Teams represent the U.S. and Puerto Rico, Germany, Spain and Canada. The competition is being on the National Mall in Washington, DC.
Ideate’s sponsored team is built on the recognition that the problem of fossil fuel depletion is one we all must address. The team is comprised of a wide range of students from diverse educational disciplines working with expert faculty members. These students, majoring in everything from engineering to communications, have come together to build a solar home, the Refract House.
Glynnis Patterson, Ideate, Inc. Director, Services Development, says, “All of the technical staff at Ideate are interested in sustainable design and building information modeling (BIM), so when we got the request for help from CCA, we knew we had to jump in. Anytime you take on a project like the Refract House, with its unconventional construction and design criteria, it's an opportunity to test your own capabilities and the capabilities of the software. Pulling our staff together to help this team was well worth the effort.”
In the Solar Decathlon, selected college and university student teams are competing to design, build and operate the most attractive, livable, marketable and energy-efficient solar-powered house. 10 specific areas are judged: architecture, engineering, market viability, communications, comfort, appliances, hot water, lighting, energy balance, and transportation. Each team is provided $100,000 seed money from DOE and must obtain sponsors for additional required funds. The Solar Decathlon complements the President's Solar America Initiative, which seeks to make solar power cost-competitive with conventional forms of electricity by 2015.
Each project house must provide enough electricity and hot water to perform all the functions of a home, from powering lights and electronics to cooking, washing clothes and dishes, plus produce enough surplus energy to power an electric car.
Ideate, Inc.’s Bronze Level sponsorship includes an Ideate a training team staffed with team members educated at Cornell, Carnegie-Mellon, and Georgia Institute of Technology. Along with training, Ideate provided books and materials to assist the SCU-CCA team with their construction of a Revit-based BIM for the SCU-CCA Refract House.
Public tours of the Solar Decathlon entries will be available on the National Mall from Oct. 8 through Oct. 18, 2009. During public tour hours, some of the team houses may be closed for competition purposes until an overall winner is announced. The Refract House will be moved, re-assembled and on display after the competition in the San Francisco Bay Area.
For an overview of the competition and project http://www.refracthouse.com/index.php
The Refract House team is collaboration of Santa Clara University and California College of the Arts in their bid to win the U.S. Department of Energy’s 2009 Solar Decathlon. Refract House is one of the 20 university-led teams selected from around the globe to compete in the DOE's fourth Solar Decathlon. Teams represent the U.S. and Puerto Rico, Germany, Spain and Canada. The competition is being on the National Mall in Washington, DC.
Ideate’s sponsored team is built on the recognition that the problem of fossil fuel depletion is one we all must address. The team is comprised of a wide range of students from diverse educational disciplines working with expert faculty members. These students, majoring in everything from engineering to communications, have come together to build a solar home, the Refract House.
Glynnis Patterson, Ideate, Inc. Director, Services Development, says, “All of the technical staff at Ideate are interested in sustainable design and building information modeling (BIM), so when we got the request for help from CCA, we knew we had to jump in. Anytime you take on a project like the Refract House, with its unconventional construction and design criteria, it's an opportunity to test your own capabilities and the capabilities of the software. Pulling our staff together to help this team was well worth the effort.”
In the Solar Decathlon, selected college and university student teams are competing to design, build and operate the most attractive, livable, marketable and energy-efficient solar-powered house. 10 specific areas are judged: architecture, engineering, market viability, communications, comfort, appliances, hot water, lighting, energy balance, and transportation. Each team is provided $100,000 seed money from DOE and must obtain sponsors for additional required funds. The Solar Decathlon complements the President's Solar America Initiative, which seeks to make solar power cost-competitive with conventional forms of electricity by 2015.
Each project house must provide enough electricity and hot water to perform all the functions of a home, from powering lights and electronics to cooking, washing clothes and dishes, plus produce enough surplus energy to power an electric car.
Ideate, Inc.’s Bronze Level sponsorship includes an Ideate a training team staffed with team members educated at Cornell, Carnegie-Mellon, and Georgia Institute of Technology. Along with training, Ideate provided books and materials to assist the SCU-CCA team with their construction of a Revit-based BIM for the SCU-CCA Refract House.
Public tours of the Solar Decathlon entries will be available on the National Mall from Oct. 8 through Oct. 18, 2009. During public tour hours, some of the team houses may be closed for competition purposes until an overall winner is announced. The Refract House will be moved, re-assembled and on display after the competition in the San Francisco Bay Area.
For an overview of the competition and project http://www.refracthouse.com/index.php
For up to the minute news from the competition, follow @Refracthouse on Twitter.
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