Before a packed auditorium today at the U.S. Capitol Visitor Center, the University of Maryland took first place in the U.S. Department of Energy Solar Decathlon Architecture Contest.

“WaterShed achieves an elegant mix of inspiration, function, and simplicity. It takes our current greatest challenges in the built environment—energy and water—and transforms them into opportunities for spatial beauty and poetry while maintaining livability in every square inch,” said Architecture Contest Juror Michelle Kaufmann.

New Zealand (Victoria University of Wellington) claimed second place for First Light, its modern interpretation of the traditional New Zealand holiday home, the Kiwi bach.

Appalachian State University received third place for its Solar Homestead, which features outdoor living spaces.

“This year’s teams have managed to raise the bar even higher and have made the job of judging the Architecture Contest extremely difficult for the jury, which tried to find the subtle distinction that separates first from second, and second from third,” Kaufmann said. “The top three projects span the globe; each celebrating its unique regional influences and climatic differences.”

For the Architecture Contest, the jury evaluated the houses on:

• Architectural elements that include the scale and proportion of room and facade features, indoor/outdoor connections, composition and linking of various house elements
• Holistic design, meaning an architectural design that will be comfortable for occupants and compatible with the surrounding environment
• Lighting, assessing the integration and energy efficiency of electrical and natural light
• Inspiration as reflected in a design that inspires and delights Solar Decathlon visitors
• Documentation that includes drawings, a project manual, and an audiovisual architecture presentation that accurately reflect the constructed project on the competition site.

For full scoring details, visit the Architecture 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.

Note: Corrections to the Affordability Contest results were announced Sept. 30, 2011.

Proving that the cost of “going green” is decreasing, two teams tied for first place in the U.S. Department of Energy Solar Decathlon 2011 Affordability Contest. Parsons The New School for Design and Stevens Institute of Technology (which includes Milano School of International Affairs, Management, and Urban Policy at The New School) built Empowerhouse for less than $230,000. Purdue University’s INhome came in at just less than $250,000. These teams earned 100 points for achieving a target construction cost of $250,000 or less, as evaluated by a professional cost estimator.

Results of the Affordability Contest were announced today in the solar village. Team Belgium (Ghent University) received second place in the contest, with its E-Cube, which was priced at $251,147. In third place was The Southern California Institute of Architecture and California Institute of Technology’s CHIP, which was estimated to cost $262,495.

“These 2011 teams have shown that solar houses can be affordable while still being innovative,” said Matt Hansen, Affordability Contest juror.

The Affordability Contest has had an impact on the design of Solar Decathlon competition houses. Compared to Solar Decathlon 2009 houses, the Solar Decathlon 2011 houses are estimated to cost 33% less. 

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

Like many of you, I have assembled everything from dining room tables to bunk beds with an Allen wrench and a beverage-stained set of black-and-white line drawings. I’ve even drilled new holes, convinced that the instructions had to be wrong, only to find out I had the board upside down—or inside out—or otherwise got caught up in some sort of “Tab A into Slot B” kerfuffle.

I was out at the U.S. Department of Energy Solar Decathlon this weekend looking over video of students describing the amazing energy-efficient houses they’ve designed and constructed for the 2011 competition here in Washington, D.C. While reviewing a story about Team Belgium‘s house, E-Cube, the video editor paused to point out the instruction manual for the house. This was not the manual to operate the house; it was instructions to build the house.

Assembly instructions for the external window shades on “E-Cube,” Team Belgium’s entry to the U.S. Department of Energy Solar Decathlon 2011.

You’ve seen them before. There is a picture of one type of screw, followed by an “x” for “times” and then the quantity of screws that was supposed to have made it from the factory, to the warehouse, to your car, to the spot on your floor where you’ve decided to spend your Saturday afternoon with eight slices of pepperoni pizza and the latest episode of “my house is cooler than yours.” Here’s the nutty thing: On the monitor, we saw the parts list for one of the steps to build E-Cube. It read something like: short screws x 60, long screws x 120, and then, at the bottom, a figure of a person … x 14. We had a good laugh. That is one complete manual! It even tells you that you need 14 people to install the window shades—for three hours!

Pieter Jan De Loof, a student at Ghent University, displays the assembly instructions for E-Cube, Team Belgium’s entry to the U.S. Department of Energy Solar Decathlon 2011.

I had to go see it myself. Pieter Jan De Loof is one of the students representing Team Belgium at this year’s decathlon. (He’ll tell you his name is four words but really two names, which is an efficiency statement in and of itself.) When I asked him how visitors are reacting to E-Cube, he said: “They love it. They love the structure, which is really a shelving system.”

It turns out those window shades—covering each of E-Cube’s windows—are actually computer-controlled and fit on the outside of the house. Pieter told me many people think those are a mistake, but he’s quick to point out that when trying to keep a house cool, it’s best to keep direct light from ever entering the house. Exterior shades, as opposed to interior shades, do just that.

Of the decathlon, Pieter said: “It’s really interesting for a student. Now you have to design and build it.”

And build it they did—in four days with 25 people. Now, E-Cube is being monitored and judged in 10 contests—along with 18 other student-designed houses—to see just how energy-efficient, livable, and affordable it is.

So if you are in the market for a highly efficient solar-powered home and you are a real do-it-yourselfer, invite 24 of your closest friends over for four days and build yourself an E-Cube.

Of course, the age-old question will remain: “I wonder where these three extra bolts go?”

Check out this video about E-Cube.

Phil West is the director of Communications for the Department of Energy’s Office of Energy Efficiency and Renewable Energy.

U.S. Department of Energy Solar Decathlon Director Richard King talks to student team members about the end of assembly in the solar village.