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.

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.

Under mostly cloudy skies and occasional light rain, U.S. Department of Energy Solar Decathlon teams continue assembling their houses around the clock to finish the assembly phase of the competition, which for most (and hopefully all) teams will end Tuesday.

New Zealand celebrates a team member’s birthday and says goodbye to its Canadian team crew from Fenshawe College in Ontario. (Credit: Richard King/U.S. Department of Energy Solar Decathlon)

Today, I attended a party that New Zealand (Victoria University of Wellington) held for a team member’s birthday and to say goodbye to their Canadian friends who came from Ontario to help them. The Canadians—from Fanshawe College—are contemplating applying for Solar Decathlon 2013, so the New Zealand team suggested they join them as team crew. Fanshawe sent a few staff and students for assembly and disassembly, and some of them will stay in Washington for the entire event.

In other news:

• Team Massachusetts (Massachusetts College of Art and Design and the University of Massachusetts at Lowell) arrived on Thursday three days late but assembled its main structure in only six hours.
• Team New Jersey (Rutgers – The State University of New Jersey and New Jersey Institute of Technology) finished installing its solar array today.
• Maryland was the first team to qualify for electricity meter installation (which happened yesterday) and as of this morning led the other teams in the number of inspections passed.

In addition, the Southern California Institute of Architecture and California Institute of Technology took my camera up in their cherry picker for some way-cool aerial views of the village.

Aerial view of the solar village, with the roof of the SCI-Arc/Caltech house in the foreground, Team Massachusetts in foreground to the left, and Team New York (The City College of New York ) to the right. Maryland is between and just behind them. (Credit: Richard King/U.S. Department of Energy Solar Decathlon)

Tomorrow will be more assembly—which will include the installation of lots of village infrastructure (tents, signage, and portable walkways for visitors)—and, no doubt, more firsts and finishes by this stellar group of teams.

Stay tuned!

Richard King is director of the U.S. Department of Energy Solar Decathlon.

U.S. Department of Energy Solar Decathlon Director Richard King talks to student team members about their assembly progress.

We have our time-lapse camera installed, so check out the views from about 40 feet above the solar village. The camera will be there throughout the entire event so everyone can keep an eye on all the happenings.

Down at ground level, you can feel the action. There are about 600 of us working with purpose:  Let’s get the competition site ready for opening day next week. You don’t see anyone sitting around unless they are eating lunch or catching a nap so they can work another few hours. The level of energy is intense, and all the activity fills your senses with excitement.

The truck carrying Team Florida’s house reached Washington, D.C., and is scheduled to unload tonight. That’s the good news. The bad news is that they are now three days behind. The team members are ready to go and undaunted. We have had teams arrive three days late in previous competitions, and they still did well. We are all pulling for you, Team Florida.

A section of Team New Jersey’s concrete house gets a lift from a 100-ton crane. (Credit: Richard King/U.S. Department of Energy Solar Decathlon)

One of the most amazing assemblies is up at the Team New Jersey lot. A 100-ton crane is lifting huge sections of its low-cost concrete house in place. The design is stunning—and heavy! It makes the ideal seashore house a cool place to live with no worries when a hurricane comes ashore. Check out the Team New Jersey website if you want to know more. I’m sure we will be talking more about this house and team before the competition is over.

Autumn is in the air. Tomorrow is supposed to be in the 50s and 60s. After the hot, humid working conditions we experienced the past two days, the fresh, cool air will be a welcome relief. Great building weather!

Richard King is director of the U.S. Department of Energy Solar Decathlon.