Results for the communications jury are in. Here is a recap, including the description of the contest from the Solar Decathlon website.

The main component of this jury was a simulated tour in which team members guided the jurors through the house in order for them to see how the house is being presented to the general public. Following a brief introduction at the front steps, Courtney Keys began with an overview of the inspiration for the house as well as a description of the landscape and passive features. Lucas Dixon explained the mechanical closet prior to the jury entering the house. Once inside, Neal Clements went over the design inspiration for the interior of the house and the manner in which one conceptually interacts with the space. Lucas went over the home automation system prior to passing the tour off to Deanna Hinkle for a demonstration of the house's operable features. Following a few brief questions, Jared Lairmore highlighted a few aspects of the tour such as the signage displays and the stamp the team provides with a link to the team website.

As always, contests are ongoing and the overall rankings change daily. You can access current standings at http://www.solardecathlon.org/scoring. Also, for more information on specific jury members, please visit http://www.solardecathlon.org/juries.cfm.

The competition has been in full swing for several days now and things are going great.  We're having a great time interacting with people during touring and can't thank everyone enough for coming out to see the house.  What a great experience.  Things have settled down a bit and we've been able to take some photos of the interior of the house.  Enjoy!

The main space looking east

Looking west at the kitchen and entertainment area

The office

The bed displayed in the down position

The kitchen

The bathroom

Looking southeast past the bed towards the closet and office

The U.S. Department of Energy Solar Decathlon has begun!  Ohio State finished all of its inspections yesterday evening and was able to compete in all of today's competitions.  We currently rank 7th of the 20 teams and are very excited for the coming competitions (click for live rankings).

Ohio State Decathlete Lucas Dixon spoke today in the Opening Ceremony of the Decathlon.  You can see his speech here on YouTube.

I'm not joking...the house is really gone. But it wasn't stolen. The house was moved yesterday afternoon from our build site to a parking lot on west campus for staging. Barring excessive winds or rain, it will be wrapped in plastic today in preparation for the trip to Washington D.C. Designing the house with the ability to split in to modules for transport took a fair bit of effort throughout this process, but in the end all of our careful attention to the details paid off because things went exactly according to plan. Ceiling panels, wall panels, and strips of the floor were removed to reveal the joints between the modules. The plumbing and electrical were pulled apart at each joint and tucked away for reconnection on the mall. The roof membrane was cut along the parapet and we'll heat weld a patch once the modules are lined up again at the competition. The only piece we forgot was a small piece of housewrap which was easily cut free with a utility knife. We secured all of the lovers and interior moving pieces to make sure they don't go anywhere in transit and build temporary side walls to enclose the space and prevent any racking that might occur. A little plywood over the windows and polycarbonate and we're ready to hit the road.

The first of many thank you's goes out to the people at Greenlawn Homes, who have generously donated their services to help us move everything to Washington D.C. and get us set up. Many of us laid awake many nights worrying about the logistics of moving everything and having Greenlawn on board has totally alleviated our concerns. After what we saw yesterday we're confident that we're in good hands. It is immediately clear that these guys are true professionals who know what they're doing and we're very fortunate to have thier help.

I have to admit, it looks strange on the build site with no house. In a few days the trailer and fence will be gone and all that will remain after 10 months of hard work is the gravel we laid for our vehicles to drive on. While it is exciting to have our house on the road, I'm sure we'll look back in the not too distant future and miss the fun we had together at the build site. Thanks again to National Rent-a-Fence for supplying the construction fence and Roger Beck for loaning his solar-powered storage trailer. Both of you have been an integral part of our success and we really appreciate your help.

Installing the temporary walls for shipping

Looking through the joint

Steve securing the glass for transport

Lowering the west module on to the ground and hooking it up to the truck

For all you aspiring architects - this is a building section.

Why do I keep thinking of Gordon Matta-Clark?

"This is going way to smooth..."

Towing the architecture past the architecture school

All three modules safely delivered to our staging area.  Thanks Greenlawn!

Deanna has a special knack for photographing me stuffed in small spaces.  Enjoy the collection.

--Neal

Stuck!

Suck it in...

Can I help you?

I'm glad this toilet is new...

Lucas getting in on the fun.

The kitchen is an exercise in coordination, sequencing, perseverance and swearing. When you're trying to make a space that is only 6'-8" long accommodate all of the items necessary to prepare a meal, space for installation gets a little tight. But this house is about efficiently using every bit of volume and trust me, we did. After fabricating the maple butcher block countertop and cutting the holes for the various appliances we took it to the site and set it in place. Fit like a glove. A couple of hours and we'd have everything installed, or so we thought...

First up was the drawer-style dishwasher. If the instructions tell you an appliance requires a rough opening that is 23-1/2" wide, and you build a cabinet 23-1/2" wide, you would expect it to fit right? Turns out the fit was a little tight, but with a little bit of gentle persuasion we got it in. Lesson learned: Give the rough opening an extra 1/8" and you won't be sorry.

The downdraft ventilation went in next and the main challenge here was routing the duct from the bottom of the blower box through the floor with only 6" of depth to make the turn. After hours of frustration for Neal and Deanna, SuperLucas stepped in and got the job done. Lesson learned: Delegate all ductwork tasks to Lucas immediately. There's no shame in deferring to the master.

The combination microwave/convection oven (aka micro-hood) beneath the cooktop went in without too much hassle, although we had to make a custom bracket to hold it up. Generally this appliance is installed above a stove and held up with two screws through the cabinet above. However, in this instance, the countertop was already in place because you can't install the downdraft ventilation without the counter. So we needed to lift up the counter to put the screws through the cabinet. But you can't install the micro-hood without first installing the downdraft ventilation behind it, which required the counter to remain in place. You see the problem. Lesson learned: Consider your sequencing when finalizing design or you'll have to fabricate a custom solution.

Finally, the Kohler sink and faucet went in and all items were installed. We only had to make a slight modification to the location of one of our holes, otherwise everything went smoothly. Lesson learned: Measure your sink flange to make sure you're not going to hit it when you drill your faucet holes.

We finished deep breaths and high fives all around. As my father always says, there's a bite to every project and it held true in the kitchen. We faced a little challenge with each step and everything took twice as long as we thought it would, but there wasn't anything we weren't able to overcome. All that is left to do is install the doors and drawer fronts and it will be ready to prepare a memorable meal in DC. We can't wait!

Installing the kitchen cabinets

Installing the micro-hood

All of the appliances installed

The kitchen with all of the doors and drawers installed...late in the day, of course.

The pull-out bed unit has been installed on its track and is operating smoothly. The bed rides on linear bearings recessed in the ceiling cavity and is supported by non-marring casters on the floor. In the stored position it aligns with the office/closet interface wall for a seamless transition. When bedtime rolls around, it is easily rolled out of the wall and flips down to reveal a queen size mattress. By combining standard Murphy Bed hardware in a custom case with an off-the-shelf set of linear bearings in the ceiling, the seemingly complex operation of moving a giant bed and storing it in a wall becomes deceptively simple.

Steve pulling the bed out in to the main space

The bed in the closed position.

The bathroom has received tile on the walls and floor and we're ready to install the interior polycarbonate and trim. The walls are a glossy 3x6 tile installed in a running bond pattern, and the floor is a 3x12 with a more matte finish. Next step is to install the fixtures. Stay tuned!

Completed floor tile with wall tile in progress.

The completed tile job/Dave and Steve installing the polycarbonate.

We'd like to thank Dave Hinkle, Deanna's father, for taking the time to pick up our sofa frame and the electronics for our entertainment center. We attempted to purchase the sofa frame locally but it was out of stock and wouldn't have been delivered in time to finish the house. Dave drove to Pittsburgh from his home in Youngstown to pick one up at another store prior to his visit to Columbus for the USC game. That equates to an extra 9-10 hours we were able to spend working on the house instead of driving. As time to finish runs short, these additional hours are significant. We should probably also thank Dave and his wife Debbie for doing such a great job raising Deanna and let them know how proud they should be of their daughter and her contributions to this project. But we won't do that because Deanna would blush and get all bashful, and we'd be accused of being sappy. So we'll stop at thanks for your help. We really appreciate it.

We haven't posted any shots of the "completed" exterior yet, so here they are! We still need to finish fabricating and installing the horizontal louvers in front of the translucent panels on the south side and install the pop-off panel over the inverter closet, but for the most part we're finished with exterior work on the house. The decks and landscaping won't be installed until we get to the mall because we don't have the space on site, but consider that an invitation to come see us in Washington D.C. We hope to see you there!

The house is now entering the finishing stages and we're dedicating a significant portion of our time to building the interior casework in the Knowlton Hall woodshop, located just down the street from the site. We're done building the closet & office, the bedroom shelving & flip-down bed unit, the bathroom vanity, the kitchen pullout shelving, and the laundry unit. In the next week, we anticipate working on the entertainment center and the lower kitchen cabinets as we receive our furniture and appliances. More photos will follow as we install the pieces. Check back!

Steve drilling pivot holes in the bed assembly.

A casework shop drawing.  (A little architecture humor for you.)

We're rolling along with the rough-ins for each system. In fact, we're virtually done with rough plumbing with the exception of the tanks below the house. We're hard at work on final wiring, hooking up the inverters, and the home automation system. We also hope to wrap up the lights shortly so we can start installing the ceiling boards. We'll post an exhaustive entry on each system once we're done, but in the mean time we'd like to thank the guys from Muetzel plumbing and Michael from Watt-1. You all have really helped out a lot and we couldn't have gotten this far without your efforts. We can't say enough how much we appreciate everything you've done and how much we've enjoyed working with all of you.

Installing the supply piping at the trailer joints.

Installing supply piping in the mechanical closet.

Michael working on the main electrical panel.

Lucas running home automation wiring.

They're in! I'll let the images speak for themselves...

The team has recently completed installation of the hardwood floor. The product is a 3" wide, random length tongue & groove board installed with a standard flooring stapler. There are two unique challenges to using a continuous hardwood floor in this house. First, the modules need to come apart and reassemble on the mall so nailing down all of the boards is not an option. To get around this issue, we created joint covers that are 4 boards wide glued together in to a solid unit. By ripping off the bottom grooves on the outermost edges we are able to set these boards in to place over the joints and create a virtually invisible joint line. By cutting 1/2" deep saw kerfs every 2" on the underside of the joint covers they become much more flexible. This will insure that the boards will lay flat and accommodate slight variations in alignment. A little carpet tape is all we should need to keep them in place. Second, the floor contains radiant tubes which would leak if they were punctured by fasteners. To solve this problem we selected a board width (3") which breaks down evenly within the spacing of the tubes (12"). By determining the maximum reach of the 2" flooring staples, we were able to start the boards in a position where they would not hit the tubes. We don't have any pictures of the completed installation because we had to cover the floor with paper and Masonite as we were working to prevent damage, but we'll be sure to put up photos of the finished interior when everything is complete.

Solar Decathlon Tip: If you're using a flooring stapler, make sure that the little screws that hold the protective rubber sole in place are fully tightened. If not, they will leave a large gash in the floor everywhere you drive a staple (very hard to see at daybreak when the sun isn't fully up) and you will have to remove several rows of boards. Ask us how we know...

The wood flooring over our radiant subfloor.

Applying paint and stain inside the house can be a time consuming and difficult process because there are always several people working on different parts of the house, kicking up dust, moving materials, etc. In order to alleviate this problem, we're trying to pre-finish as many elements off-site as possible. In the case of the ceiling boards, which consist of 1/2" plywood ripped to 12" wide, laying the boards flat on a set of sawhorses does the trick. The plywood is prefinished, so we only have to spray one side with a coat of primer and a couple coats of white latex paint. Some things, however, require building custom fixtures to make the process go faster. In the case of the slats for the louvers, we built a hanging rack so we could finish all sides of each slat at once. (And so we don't get hit with any safety violations, I should mention that right after this picture was taken we thought better of standing on a bucket and got a stepladder.)

Some things you just have to finish on site. We've been taking turns priming and painting late in the day after a bulk of the site activity has ended. While the house isn't large by today's suburban standards, there are still a lot of windows to cut around and a lot of nooks and crannies. Thanks to everyone who has helped out with this tedious but important effort.

Spraying the boards.

The custom built louver finishing rack.

Tedious painting around the windows.

Painting the mechanical room.

Just about everyone is familiar with "D-Day" the start of the Normandy Invasion that led to the end of World War II in Europe.  However, it is lesser known that D-Day is not a term specific to June 6, 1944; D-Day (short for 'day of days') is the actual start of a campaign and the days leading up to it are counted down D - 3, D - 2, D -1 and the following are counted up D+1, D+2, D+3....  Our own D-Day is September 30, 2009, when our house will go forth from Columbus to Washington D.C.. We like sharing tidbits, just like this one.

In the spirit of spreading information, great changes are going to be coming to the OSU Solar Decathlon website in the days leading up to competition.  There will be more content in each of the sections, with more useful information about the competition, resources to apply alternative energy solutions to your own homes and better guides to further your knowledge and enable you to work for a better energy future.  One of the changes, to make finding new content easier, will be updates on the homepage about the latest and greatest stuff to see in the coming weeks, along with the current score and rank of OSU as the competition progresses.

Work continued today on Solar House 1.  Installation and calibration of the sensors and other controls equipment was executed.  Only fine-tuning remains on the house's control system.  Soon, we will be harmonizing our house's climate controls with the weather and catering our energy consumption to our sun's radiation.  While little over three weeks remain before OSU Solar Decathlon is DC-bound, we are confident that we will be ready.

FOX 28 - WTTE visited OSU Solar Decathlon at Solar House I yesterday.  Five members of the Team were interviewed in segments live on Good Day Columbus.  Lucas, James, Bethany, Erin, and Jared discussed an overview of the house, the pillow tank water system, events at the Decathlon, home automations controls, and design and barn siding.  You can see the segments here. Thanks to everybody involved for making this happen, especially Johnny and Adam at Fox 28. 

Another piece of the exterior envelope has been installed. The translucent polycarbonate panels on the south side of the house are complete with the exception of the hopper window in the bathroom. Special thanks go out to APSCO for donating and fabricating the aluminum extrusions and trim pieces for these openings. It was a bit of a family affair, as Steve Winter's father worked for APSCO prior to his retirement, and his older brother Brad is a current employee. Brad made a special trip from the Cleveland area down to Columbus after work one night last week to help us set the PolyGal polycarbonate panels and make sure everything was sealed up just right. It was a bit of a late night, but we got it all done. Thanks Brad. You really came through for us.

And now for a side story just because I got a kick out of it when Steve told me. Brad and Steve's dad came to Columbus in June to visit for graduation, and the three of them went to the site that Saturday night just before dusk to take a look at the house. They got to talking about whether or not we had verified if the house would fit under bridges. A bit nervous at the prospect of a newsworthy disaster, Steve got out the tape measure. Steve's dad stood back, eyeballed the facade, and said, "Looks like about 13'-2"." Steve hooked the tape measure on to the parapet and dropped it to the ground. You guessed it....13'-2" right on the nose. Dad's still got it.

--Neal

Brad and Carmen in Cleveland after they fabricated the VistaWall frames for the team.

Pre-drilling the aluminum angle stops.

Brad caulking the frame...who knew cake decorating tools also work well on sealant?

Finishing up under the street lights.

A clear photo of the panels from the next morning.

A close-up of the finished product.

A large portion of our seemingly enormous mechanical closet has now been filled in with the solar-thermal system. We would like to extend our sincere thanks to Dave Hammontree and his team for their generous donation of materials and help installing everything. We have one rack of evacuated tubes mounted on the south side of the west module, and another rack mounted on the roof. These tubes cycle water through a loop in to the large tank in the mechanical closet, which in turn helps heat the water for our radiant floor system and domestic water. The bulk of the piping runs within the west module so we will only have a few connections to make under the house once we get to Washington DC. We can't wait to wrap up the final finishing touches, install the evacuated tubes and test it out!

The manifold mounted on the southwest module.

The mechanical closet with our new tank.

In this van came a crew with a plan.  Thanks everyone!

The manifold on the roof, ready for tubes.

Dave (in navy blue) generously sharing his knowledge.

The rest of the siding is finished with the exception of small areas on the east and west ends we're waiting to install until we're done with the louvers. As expected, the east, west, and south sides took considerably less time because the pieces were much smaller and easier to work with. We're within a few weeks of completely wrapping up the exterior and moving to the interior full-time. We'll post photos of the finished product, so be sure to check back!

A view of the south east corner of the house.

The parapets have been capped with sheet metal copings and we've started installing the salvaged barn siding on the north side of the house.  While it has been exciting to see this part of the exterior take shape, we've realized that this is going to be a long, tedious process.  As one might expect with salvaged material, it has a fair amount of variability in terms of thickness, warping, cupping, and bowing.  We've developed a few jigs to help position the wood and locate the screw holes which has sped up the process some, but a fair amount of care is still required to make sure that each board ends up plumb and straight with an even gap along its length.  All that said, we couldn't be more pleased with the final results thus far.  All of the work that has gone in to preparing and installing the siding is really going to pay off in the end.

We've also made a great deal of progress lining the exterior mechanical cubbies and the east and west porch walls with Hardie Board panels.  A stark contrast to the rough, weathered texture of the barn siding, the Hardi-Board is a crisp, white, smooth surface.  Also in stark contrast to the barn siding, the Hardie Board installs quickly and easily with minimal fuss.

The major focus in the coming weeks will be finishing up the exterior cladding while work on the MEP rough-in continues inside.  Check back for updates!

Steve fabricating the sheet metal for the parapet caps.

Driving screws to attach the siding: one of thousands.

Siding and Hardie Board progress on the north side.

A labor of love.

Click on the link below to download the June/July edition of our newsletter.

You can see our team picture, and also find out what we've been up to so far this Summer.

Go Bucks!

With the exception of the area around the scuppers where we're still waiting on metal trim pieces, we've completed installing the rigid insulation and furring strips to receive the barn siding.  The rigid insulation, generously donated by Owens Corning, will serve as an additional layer of protection against the elements and reduce the effects of thermal bridging through the studs.  The furring will hold the barn siding away from the house in order to create an air space behind the wood.  This principle is known as a rainscreen and it allows any water that gets behind the siding to drain out instead of becoming trapped.  The air space allows the back side of the siding to dry out, reducing potential for rot.

A view of the northeast corner of the house with rigid insulation and furring installed.

All of our students came together over the last week or so to make a major last push on the submittals required by the Department of Engery for payment.  Engineering team worked on their drawings, energy analysis, and narratives and our outreach team came together with the market viability section, communications plan, and dinner menus.

Our architecture team worked frantically through the weekend and the first couple days of the week to pull our Construction Drawings together.  Neal worked from home despite being sick putting together our cost estimate while Steve worked away at our specifications.  Dave and Deanna put the finishing touches on our drawings while Jared and Dan formatted everything into a consistent and catchy graphic package and Keoni and I revised, bookmarked, and threw it all together.  Whew- what a lot of work!

-Erin

Click on the link below to download the OSU Team's May 2009 newsletter!

Get caught up on construction progress, see what our team members were up to for Earth Day, and learn about our school tours!

The team has been hard at work on the roof membrane over the last week and we're now officially watertight.  Day 1 was cut short by rain but we got a solid start on the east module.  Day 2 was filled with sunshine and we were able to install all of the remaining insulation and most of the membrane.  All that was left for Day 3 was pitch pockets and final detailing and we were finished by mid-afternoon.

Special thanks go out to Todd and Elvis from Phinney Industrial for helping us out with this effort.  They were with us every step of the way teaching us how to properly install every piece of the roof.  Their guidance was crucial to getting everything done efficiently and done right.  We learned a lot and we had a great time in the process.  We'd also like to thank Mike DeCrane at Phinney Industrial for setting everything up.  We couldn't have done it without all of your help.

-Neal

Day 1 - Gluing down the membrane on the east module.

Day 2 - Cutting the membrane to size.

Day 2 - The crew after a solid day of work (novices in gray hardhats, teachers in red...Todd on the left, Elvis on the right.)

Day 3 - The finished roof looking from northeast to southwest. 

We'd like to take a moment to thank Owens Corning for all of their support so far.  The rigid insulation and housewrap have been delivered and we've started the installation.  We also really apprecaited the site visit from the Owens Corning team.  We had a great time meeting everyone and their insight has been most valuable.  As you can see in the picture, we're finished installing the standoffs for the solar panels on the roof and we've pre-cut all of the rigid insulation so we can lay it down quickly when the roof membrane gets here next week.  We're looking forward to finishing the roof so we can start roughing in plumbing, electrical, and HVAC.

- Neal

Eager to see how construction is progressing?  Check out this live image of our house.

Eager to see how construction is progressing?  Check out this live image of our house.

Rough framing of the house is nearly complete and should be finished during next week's spring break. The architecture team has placed the window order and is working on finalizing the details to dry in the house before the windows arrive. Some of the engineering systems will also be delivered soon as the engineering team has been working very hard to complete their designs.

-Steve

Click on the link below to download the OSU Team's March 2009 Newsletter!

In this one we have quite a few things such as more construction updates, info about our documentary, and a profile of our Market Viability Team!

Download the February edition of our newsletter by clicking on the link below.

The Columbus Dispatch ran an article about our team on the front page of the Metro/State section on Monday, February 16th.  You can access the full text here!  The team would like to thank Kevin Mayhood at the Dispatch for such a great article.

We are building our house in three modules that will be transported separately to Washington, D.C. Therefore, each module was designed to be stucturally independent. The center module was started first and is nearly complete. After it is finished we will be able to construct the adjoining walls on the east and west modules and install the connection components that will help hold the house together.

- Steve

The team recently raised the first wall on the Solar Decathlon House. The 2 x 6 wall section is on the north side of the house and will enclose part of the kitchen and entertainment areas. The section was built with advanced framing techniques using 2x6 studs placed on a 24" on center layout. Because the roof joists are designed to bear directly on the wall studs, the wall assembly requires no double top plate, reducing the amount of wood required. The 5 1/2" inch wall cavity can also accomodate more insulation than the 3 1/2" cavity of a conventional 2x4 stud wall,  increasing R - values. Also, notice that openings are reduced on the north side as part of a passive strategy to save energy. The north side of a building gets less sun and is exposed to the most extreme winter winds, thus contributing to more heat loss. Therefore, reducing penetrations on the north facade can save on energy costs, especially in the winter.

Special thanks to Phil Arnold from the Knowlton School of Architecture (with camera) who is helping us document our build.

- Steve

Today we received a really lovely note from one of our major sponsors, Integrys Energy Services, that we wanted to share. Hopefully, the warm thoughts below will make you smile too.  -Erin

Dear Solar Decathletes (and their faculty supporters),

Thank you for having us with you last week, to bask (if not in the sun) in the creative energy that you emit as you undertake a host of technical and organizational challenges to be completed in the remainder of the academic year (plus, evenings, weekends, and probably in to the summer).

Since I live in Ohio too, and work for a company with ambitious solar projects of its own, I am often questioned on how a cloudy state like Ohio can host effective solar projects.   What the questioners often fail to realize, is that the spirit of environmental stewardship is not about how much resource you have, but about how well you make use of it.

Here in central Ohio , we may be a little poor in sunshine, but we have the great fortune of being illuminated by over 40,000 individulas from all over the world.   These students and faculty members at OSU come here because they believe that a well-informed mind is a necessary advantage as we try to tackle new problems with new approaches.

For my part, and on behalf of Integrys, our investment in the OSU solar decathlon team is our vote of confidence that our collective interests are best served by supporting the creativity of youth who have not yet inherited our outdated notions.   Under the tutelage of faculty not beholden to our commercial interests, we hope that you will contribute; to our industry, creativity and knowledge; and to our planet, health and prosperity.

Thank you , and good luck!

Charles A. Koontz
General Manager
Renewables, Efficiency, and Conservation
Integrys Energy Services

We had a great meeting last with Hull & Associates. We learned alot about all the great work they are doing and made some great contacts withing the community. We look forward to continuing to work with Hull & Associates in the near future. Thanks to all those that made it happen!

~Lucas

We had a great meeting last with Hull & Associates. We learned alot about all the great work they are doing and made some great contacts withing the community. We look forward to continuing to work with Hull & Associates in the near future. Thanks to all those that made it happen!

~Lucas

We had a beautiful day on Saturday to install the radiant subfloor that was donated to us by Warmboard Inc. The subfloor is 1 1/4" thick and has grooves that will accomodate the radiant tubing that will heat our house. When people think of radiant floors they typically think of concrete. However, concrete would not be practical for a house that has to roll to Washington, D.C.  We therefore chose a plywood panel system with an aluminum top layer that performs better than concrete at transferring heat evenly. The product consists of 5  4'x8' panel types that can be arranged to work with any floor plan, requiring little additional work. 

-Steve

The floor framing is now complete and we are ready to install our subfloor. All energy for construction is being provided by a solar powered storage container loaned to us by Roger Beck and the Home BASE project. Appropriately, every element of construction is being powered by the sun.

-Steve

As Ohio State's autumn quarter winds down we are ready to make great strides in two very important aspect of our project. First, December 16th is the deadline for Construction Documentation. We will submit our drawings and project manual to NREL electronically and wait for their feedback. Secondly, with classes over we can really get going on construction. As you may have seen the trailers are on site, leveled, and ready to go. We are waiting on our first lumber delivery and some free time to really get things kicking. We hope to make great progress during break.

P.S. Our WarmBoard delivery has arrived and is awesome stuff. It is part of the radiant floor system and will be key to keeping the house toasty all winter long. Special thanks for this great in kind donation.

~Lucas

OSU explains how they are creating a more sustainable campus in this short video featuring our teammate Niffy Ovuworie.

http://www.osu.edu/features/2008/green/

-Erin

The Solar Decathlon Project was mentioned in the Knowlton School of Architecture Summer Newsletter on Page 4.  We're happy to have their support for our project!

-Erin

KSA Faculty and Students Compete in Solar Decathlon

A team of Ohio State students will participate in the Solar Decathlon, a U.S. Department of Energy-sponsored competition to design, build and operate the most engaging, energy-efficient, solar-powered home. The Ohio State Solar Decathlon team is one of 20 teams that were selected from universities around the world. Each team receives $100,000 from the Department of Energy for their project. The competition challenges teams to develop a solar-powered home that meets various requirements in architecture, engineering, livability, comfort and power generation.

The two-year Solar Decathlon contest culminates in Fall 2009 when the fully solar-powered homes will be shipped to the National Mall in Washington, D.C. for display and final judging. Ohio State’s Solar Decathlon team includes students from various disciplines, including Architecture, Construction Systems Management, Engineering, Environmental and Natural Resources, and Political Science.

Architecture adjunct instructor Keoni Fleming, and Lisa Tilder, associate professor of Architecture, are among the faculty contributors.

Click on this post to download a complete copy.

The Construction trailer arrived at our build site last Thursday. It looks great with two solar panels collecting the power to build our house! Special thanks to Roger Beck and the HomeBASE program for allowing us to use the trailer. It is awesome to see something physical on the site--we are one step closer to D.C.!

~Lucas

The Solar Decathlon team will have a information booth at our build site, just south east of Ohio Stadium, during the pregame festivities for the Penn State vs. The Ohio State University football game this Saturday. We will be setup from 4-7p.m. so there is plenty of time to come and check out our progress, learn more about the house, and meet the team. As an added bonus we may be hosting a few members of the Penn State Solar decathlon team. Hope to see you all there.

Go Bucks!

Lucas

Exciting news today! After months of waiting we have been approved for a building location on central campus. The site we were approved for was our first choice and we are pleased to announce we will be constructing our home on a bit of green space adjacent to the South East corner of the Ohio Stadium. The green space is directly south of the McCracken Power plant auxiliary building. Congrats and thanks go out to all those that made this site a reality. We will have a booth setup on the space for this Saturdays football game against Purdue. Hope to see you all on game day!

~Lucas

Last Friday evening team members Erin, Bethany, Derek, James, Carson, Kurtis, and myself were honored to attend the 2008 Governors’ Gala, Green Energy Ohio's Solar Tour kickoff. The governor’s residence was a beautiful backdrop for the crowd of probably 200. The team had a display setup and enjoyed talking to the many friends we have made over the last year. As Kurtis said, "It is pretty amazing that we know almost half of the people here." Ms. Strickland, Mark Shanahan, and Bill Spratley all spoke at the event hyping up the Solar Tour. It certainly was a good time had by all as we acknowledged all the work done to get the Renewable Energy Portfolio Standard (senate bill 221) passed last spring. A new day has dawned in Ohio, a day powered by renewable energy. The Solar Decathlon Team is grateful for all the support we continue to receive from the GEO community. Special thanks to Sarah and Julie for putting together such a superb event.

~Lucas

Last Thursday the Solar Decathlon team returned to the Green Building Expo for the second straight year. It is hard to believe that it was only one year ago that just a couple of students with big dreams showed up at the doors of the Green Building Expo hoping to absorb as much information from the sustainability community. We have certainly been welcomed into the sustainability family with open arms. We returned to the expo this year and had a very successful booth. Special thanks and congratulations to Meera for once again an outstanding event.

Come check out the project, meet members of the team, and get free PIZZA!

This Sunday, Sept 28th

5-6pm

Orton Hall, Rm 110

We will have a brief presentation about the project, after which everyone will have a chance to talk and ask questions.  This is a perfect opportunity to do something great!!

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