Consistently appearing in first place in overall standings throughout the competition, the University of Maryland won the U.S. Department of Energy Solar Decathlon 2011. Secretary of Energy Steven Chu announced the competition results today before an excited audience that packed the main tent in the solar village.

“Maryland is a well-experienced team. After taking second place in 2007, they rested and regrouped in 2009 and came to West Potomac Park in 2011 focused and determined to win,” said Solar Decathlon Director Richard King. “In addition, Maryland’s Watershed is a beautiful house, judged first place in Architecture, which also performed impeccably in measured contests. This team mastered their strategies to ensure they excelled in all 10 contests.”

Purdue University took second place in the competition, and New Zealand (Victoria University of Wellington) received the third-place award.

The winner of the competition is the team that best blends affordability, consumer appeal, and design excellence with optimal energy production and maximum efficiency.

Results for the fifth and final juried contest, Market Appeal, were announced today prior to the competition winners. Middlebury College placed first.

“Self-Reliance left the jury very impressed, eclipsing our expectations across the board in livability and marketability,” said Brad Beeson, Market Appeal juror. “Middlebury College defined its market carefully—a young family of four with a modest income for the region—and demonstrated the fit for that target market with a very compelling video.”

Maryland came in second in Market Appeal, and New Zealand came in third.

The Market Appeal contest judges each house’s livability, buildability, and marketability.

For more final results, see the Solar Decathlon 2011 scores and standings.

Carol Anna is the communications manager of the U.S. Department of Energy Solar Decathlon.

With exemplary communications materials, public tours, and website, Middlebury College received first place in the U.S. Department of Energy Solar Decathlon Communications Contest today.

“Middlebury College, this year’s winner of the Communications Contest, is a very authentic team that conveyed the best of New England architecture. This team’s holistic approach to communications was refreshing; they achieved in all aspects of communications—not just in one area,” said Ryan Park, director of business development for REC Solar Inc., who presented the award on behalf of the Communications Contest jurors. “This team made renewable energy technologies familiar to the public, which we believe will help people more easily embrace these technologies. And isn’t that what it’s all about?”

Appalachian State University received second place for its contagious passion and enthusiasm. The jurors felt the team offered the best menu of creatively explained ideas that visitors could take home and implement today.

Winning third place, the University of Maryland presented consistent messaging, strong educational exhibit components, and a compelling story.

The Communications contest jury evaluated:

• Web content quality, appropriateness, and originality
• Video walkthrough information, the accuracy of the representation of the as-built house on the competition site, accessible captioning, clarity of the audio narrative, and creativity
• The quality of onsite graphics, photos, displays, and signage
• The delivery of messages to target audiences and people of all abilities
• The use of innovative methods to engage audiences, including Web site visitors and people waiting to tour a house.

“Some people might wonder why communications is included in a competition to design and build solar houses. It’s important because communication is our tool for educating the greater population about everything we’re working toward with the Solar Decathlon,” said Richard King, Solar Decathlon director. “In fact, communication is the most powerful thing you can do to spread our message across the globe. We’re not going to succeed if people don’t know what we’re doing. We’re here to show our houses and tell our story. Otherwise, there’s no reason to be here.”

For full scoring details, visit the Communications Contest scores page.

Carol Anna is the communications manager of the U.S. Department of Energy Solar Decathlon.

It may seem like all work all the time for the U.S. Department of Energy Solar Decathlon’s student decathletes, but one contest brings teams together to earn points while relaxing and interacting with one another.

The Home Entertainment Contest includes the following five subcontests:

• Lighting
• Cooking
• Home Electronics
• Dinner Party
• Movie Night.

The first three are task-based subcontests that require the teams to keep interior and exterior lights on at night, perform four cooking tasks during contest week, and operate a TV and computer during specified hours. The last two are juried subcontests, but they are not like other juried contests in the competition. In these cases, the teams’ neighbors become jurors.

During the Solar Decathlon, teams host two dinner parties for up to eight guests in their houses. Six of these guests are members of neighboring teams. The visiting team members score the host team on the quality of the meal, ambiance, and overall experience.

Middlebury College student Melissa Segil prepares a dish for a competition dinner party while teammate Erik Fendik, background, catches up on some sleep. (Credit: Stefano Paltera/U.S. Department of Energy Solar Decathlon)

On Monday night, the decathletes shared regionally inspired meals, conversation, and compliments with one another. The final dinner party will take place tonight.

“We’ve been doing practice dinners for team bonding since last fall,” says Melissa Segil, team manager for Middlebury College. “It was so fun to use the kitchen, which is one of our favorite parts of the house.”

Last night, the teams also invited their neighbors over for movie night. Many teams have elaborate, yet highly energy-efficient, home entertainment systems for this contest. The visiting teams evaluated the quality and design of the home theater system, ambiance, and overall experience in their fellow competitors’ houses.

To get a taste of the Home Entertainment Contest at home, try making some of the team recipes, which are available on our team pages.

Alexis Powers is a member of the Solar Decathlon communications team.

Samuel Mikhail, team leader of Team New York (City College of New York), celebrates the diversity of his team during the All-Team Meeting. (Credit: Carol Anna/U.S. Department of Energy Solar Decathlon)

Filled with energy and excitement, the student teams gathered the All-Team Meeting tonight to kick off the U.S. Department of Energy Solar Decathlon 2011. The teams—representing 13 U.S. states, five countries, and four continents—received an enthusiastic send-off from Solar Decathlon organizers and sponsors in preparation for the assembly phase of the competition, which begins later tonight.

Over a buffet dinner, Melissa Segil of Middlebury College explained how the Solar Decathlon has had a powerful impact on her education.

“I’ve learned more on this one project than I have in four years of college,” Melissa said. “Each of our team members worked to construct our house. The Solar Decathlon is an amazing hands-on educational experience.”

Members of Team China (Tongji University) greet decathletes from other Solar Decathlon teams at the All-Team Meeting. (Credit: Carol Anna/U.S. Department of Energy Solar Decathlon)

Over the next seven days, the teams will work around the clock to build their highly energy-efficient, solar-powered houses at the National Mall’s West Potomac Park. The Solar Decathlon opens to the public on Friday, Sept. 23, at 10 a.m.

Carol Anna is the communications manager of the U.S. Department of Energy Solar Decathlon.

Editor’s Note: This entry has been cross-posted from DOE’s Energy Blog.

In honor of the U.S. Department of Energy Solar Decathlon—which challenges 20 collegiate teams to design, build, and operate solar-powered houses that are cost-effective, energy-efficient, and attractive—we are profiling each of the 20 teams participating in the competition.

Located in Vermont’s Champlain Valley, with the Green Mountains to the east of campus and the Adirondacks to the west, Middlebury College seems like a naturally suited location for a Solar Decathlon team. For decades, the school has made sustainability a priority, and it launched the first environmental studies major in the nation in 1965. Since then, new buildings built on campus have incorporated energy-saving features and used sustainable and recycled materials. Middlebury’s Franklin Environmental Center received a LEED Platinum award for its environmental design, and the school has committed to become carbon-neutral by 2016. The campus also houses a new biomass plant, which boasts a gasification system that converts regionally grown wood chips into gas, which it then burns to provide steam for heating, cooling, hot water, and cooking throughout the campus.

With all this focus on sustainability, it should come as no surprise that, two years ago, Architectural Studies major Addison Godine and three other students created a proposal for the Solar Decathlon competition. Since then, the team has worked long hours together and grown to a group of more than 75 students from across 18 majors.

The Middlebury team at its recent "wall-raising" event. (Courtesy of the Middlebury Solar Decathlon team)

We spoke with Addison, the team’s student project lead, and Melissa Segil, the team manager and an International Politics and Economics double major to find out more about the team and its design.

The house, which the team named Self-Reliance after the essay by Ralph Waldo Emerson, was inspired by the design of a traditional New England farmhouse. The team is using only natural building materials, including sustainably harvested wood from local forests, recycled insulation, and natural finishes and paints. The house also uses high-performance, triple glazed windows with insulated frames that will maximize the amount of natural light allowed in.

The goal of the Middlebury team has been to produce an affordable house that is both functional and comfortable for a family of four. Although the house is smaller than the average American home, the team has maximized its square footage by creating two distinct zones that separate the “public” area from the “private.” The public space contains a greenhouse and a kitchen and dining area for food preparation for the family and its guests.  Two bedrooms are located in the more private side of the house. The house has an “as-built” budget of less than $250,000—an impressive feat.

A model of Self-Reliance (Courtesy of the Middlebury Solar Decathlon team)

Addison says the best part of the Solar Decathlon experience so far has been the ability to work with a group of students in the college atmosphere that are “dedicated to a project because they believe in it, not because they have to participate for a class.”

Melissa says she has really enjoyed the outreach that the project involves.

“It’s been awesome to be able to share the process with the community,” she says. “We’ve held open houses and symposiums, and it’s been really fun to be able to tell other people about the project and hear from excited parents, grandparents, and others in the Middlebury community.”

Both Addison and Melissa say the team has run across a few challenges, including the fact that the small liberal arts college is one of few in the competition without a professional architecture program. But the team has persevered. They’ve powered through a major design change and seen cycles of students come and go. (Many Middlebury students study abroad during their undergraduate years.)

Aside from the challenges, Melissa is happy to report that the team recently began construction on the house over the school’s spring break. “We’re really having a blast now that construction has started,” she says.

After the conclusion of the competition, the Middlebury team plans to bring the house back from Washington, D.C., to the Middlebury campus. Melissa says the house will become a residence for students and simultaneously serve as an environmental outreach center that will host events to promote sustainability.

To learn more about Self-Reliance and the Middlebury College team, visit its website, where you can read its blog or see videos that the team has made.

April Saylor is an online content producer and contractor to the Department of Energy Office of Public Affairs.