Solar Decathlon and XPO Recap

Today marks the last day of the 2 week long 2013 Solar Decathlon competition at Irvine Great Park. If you didn't have a chance to check out this fantastic event, you're in the right place to learn more and get a taste of some of the ideas that the competitors put out there.

If you're short on time, this video gives a quick overview of what you missed:

The more detailed version:

The Solar Decathlon is a competition that challenges college teams from all around the world to build houses that are affordable, appealing to consumers, and optimally produce and conserve energy (within certain constraints.) The Irvine site (as opposed to the European or Chinese sites) hosted 20 teams this year.

Each team spent 2 years designing and building their houses. 3 weeks ago, the houses were dismantled, shipped to Irvine Great Park, and reassembled for the competition.

The teams competed in 10 areas (thus the name Solar Decathlon):

1. Architecture
Architectural elements such as holistic design, lighting, inspiration, and documentation

2. Market Appeal
Livability, marketability, and buildability based on the target client of each team's choosing

3. Engineering
Functionality, efficiency, innovation, reliability, and documentation

4. Communications
Web content, audiovisual presentation, etc

5. Affordability

6. Comfort Zone
Temperature and humidity ranges

7. Hot Water
Must supply all the heated water for daily needs, including showering and laundry

8. Appliances
Must mimic actual appliance use in a real house

9. Home Entertainment
Includes holding two dinners parties and a movie night for 6 "neighboring" competitors, who act as jurors by awarding points based on ambiance, meal quality, and overall experience.

10. Energy Balance
Must produce more energy than they consume

Each team could earn up to 100 points per category. There was a winner for each category as well as for the overall competition.

The Teams at a Glance:

For more details, please visit their pages and read more!

1. Arizona State University and University of New Mexico
823/1000 points 
DOE page: http://www.solardecathlon.gov/team_asu_unm.html
Team website: http://www.asunm.org/

2. Czech Republic: Czech Technical University 
945 /1000 points | 1st place in architecture | 3rd Overall
DOE page: http://www.solardecathlon.gov/team_czech_republic.html
Team website: http://www.airhouse.cz/

3. Kentucky/Indiana: University of Louisville, Ball State University, and University of Kentucky
850/1000 points
DOE page: http://www.solardecathlon.gov/team_kentucky_indiana.html
Team website: http://sd2013.teamkentuckiana.org/

4. Middlebury College (Vermont)
920/1000 points | Tied for 1st place in Hot Water
This is a liberal arts college!
DOE page: http://www.solardecathlon.gov/team_middlebury.html
Team website: http://sd13.middlebury.edu/

5. Missouri University of Science and Technology
840/1000 points
DOE page: http://www.solardecathlon.gov/team_missouri.html
Team website: http://solarhouse.mst.edu/

6. Norwich (VT)
876/1000 points | Tied for 1st in Affordability
DOE page: http://www.solardecathlon.gov/team_norwich.html
Team website: http://nusd2013.org/

7. Santa Clara University
888/1000 points | 1st in Home Entertainment and Comfort Zone
DOE page: http://www.solardecathlon.gov/team_santa_clara.html
Team website: http://www.scuradianthouse.org/

8. Southern California Institute of Architecture and California Institute of Technology
868/1000 points 
DOE page: http://www.solardecathlon.gov/team_sci_arc_caltech.html
Team website: http://scical2013.com/

9. Stanford University
933/1000 points | Tied for 1st for Affordability | 5th Overall
DOE page: http://www.solardecathlon.gov/team_stanford.html
Team website: http://solardecathlon.stanford.edu/

10. Stevens Institute of Technology
939/1000 points | Tied for 1st in Hot Water, 2nd in Architecture | 4th Overall
DOE page: http://www.solardecathlon.gov/team_stevens.html
Team website: http://www.stevens.edu/sd2013/

11. Team Alberta: University of Calgary
913/1000 points | Ranked 1st in appliances
DOE page: http://www.solardecathlon.gov/team_alberta.html
Team website: http://www.solardecathlon.ca/

12. Team Austria: Vienna University of Technology
951/1000 points | Ranked 2nd in Market Appeal, Tied for 1st in Hot Water, 1st in Communications | Ranked #1 Overall
DOE page: http://www.solardecathlon.gov/team_austria.html
Team website: http://www.solardecathlon.at/

13. Team Capital DC: The Catholic University of America, George Washington University, and American University
920/1000 points | Ranked 2nd for Comfort Zone and Home Entertainment
DOE page: http://www.solardecathlon.gov/team_capitol_dc.html
Team website: http://www.teamcapitoldc.org/

14. Team Ontario: Queen's University, Carleton University, and Algonquin College
926/1000 points | Ranked 2nd in Affordability & 1st in Engineering, tied for 1st in Hot Water
DOE page: http://www.solardecathlon.gov/team_ontario.html
Team website: http://ontariosd.ca/

15. Team Texas: University of Texas at El Paso and El Paso Community College
776/1000 points
DOE page: http://www.solardecathlon.gov/team_texas.html
Team website: http://engineering.utep.edu/

16. Tidewater Virginia: Hampton University and Old Dominion University
DOE page: http://www.solardecathlon.gov/team_tidewater_virginia.html
Team website: http://www.canopyhouse.org/

17. University of Nevada Las Vegas
947/1000 points | 2nd in Communications, 1st in Market Appeal, tied for 1st in Hot Water | 2nd Overall
DOE page: http://www.solardecathlon.gov/team_lasvegas.html
Team website: http://solardecathlon.unlv.edu/

18. University of North Carolina at Charlotte
870/1000 points
DOE page: http://www.solardecathlon.gov/team_north_carolina.html
Team website: http://urbaneden.uncc.edu/

19. University of Southern California
906/1000 points | 1st in Appliances
DOE page: http://www.solardecathlon.gov/team_southern_california.html
Team website: http://solardecathlon.usc.edu/

20. West Virginia University
774/1000 points
DOE page: http://www.solardecathlon.gov/team_west_virginia.html
Team website: http://solar.wvu.edu/

Be sure to check out http://www.solardecathlon.gov for a full breakdown of every aspect of the competition and the teams including more videos and photos!

You can also check out photos taken at the event by visiting Soka students here.

If you'd like to learn more about sustainable housing, you might like to look into Earth Ships. Last year's Spring Eco Wing won the SSU grant to attend an Earthship workshop in LA, and so they have collected a few resources on the subject, including a full length documentary available for free on youtube. There's also more information at the official Earthship Biotecture website.

-

There was also a green innovation XPO simultaneously happening at Great Park. For obvious reasons, we spent more time exploring the houses, but we did take a few minutes to check out a few of the booths on things like aquaculture gray water filtration for gardens and 3D printing biodegradable plastic forms.

This last one in particular is worth mentioning because it's really cool, potentially scary for some people, and ACTUALLY UNDER WAY RIGHT NOW:

Welcome to the future. What are you going to contribute to it?

CicLAvia Recap

On Sunday October 6th, students from Professor Deike Peters's Sustainable Cities Class made an appearance at 
CicLAvia.

Although this particular event has come and gone, 

keep your eyes peeled for more CicLAvia events this spring! 

Until then, keep reading for a "Virtual Tour" of our walking tour through LA 

+ fun highlights of the event + informational links provided by Deike + perspectives on what it felt like to walk the streets of LA. 

* The Journey through LA *

This was our route: click me!

1. Caught the metro to LA at Laguna Nigel 

2. Met up at LA's Union Station
The station (and the surrounding area) is currently being redeveloped to better accommodate not only rail users but also bus riders, pedestrians, and cyclists. Find information about this project and the history of Union Station, look here.

3. Walked past LA's busy HistoricPlaza/El Pueblo and Olvera Street
For more information about the history of this part of town, check here.

4. From there we made our way to Chinatown.
Remember that this is LA’s new, (forcibly) relocated Chinatown, as the Old Chinatown was displaced and razed when Union Station was built in the 1930s. We saw the big new ForestCity’s Blossom Plaza mixed use project close to the Gold Line transit station as well as the China Gateway project JiaApartments just nearing completion at Broadway and Cesar Chavez.

5. We crossed the 101 Freeway
and thought about how amazing it would be to cap this great concrete divide and put a park on top, reconnecting the two halves of the city again. Up to date on this ambitious project can be found here.

6. Stopped at the newly opened Grand Park
It opened exactly a year ago and has been named one of the top 10 new open spaces in the country. There was a November 2013 article about it in the NY Times. There were food trucks and activity booths here.

Giant checkers at the games booth

Teaching kids about street safety

A bracelet made at the crafts booth from old bike tubing

7. Photo Op at City Hall 

8. We continued down the route to Spring Street

A remaining strip of the green paint

and saw that the green paint for the Spring Street bike lane had already been mostly scraped off, as the film industry complained about it and won. 

9. On Gallery Row
where there are weekly art walks on Thursday evenings, we marveled at how quiet the streets were without the noise of car traffic. Even the shouting of some of the rowdier cyclists wasn't as intrusive. We didn't feel like we were even in LA!

10. We also found a pocket park
designed by Lehrer Architects, which was created via a public private partnership, with the main initiative coming from the non-profit group Friend of the Old Bank District Gardens, with dedicatedfunding from American Apparel and planning help from the city. The park remains a public facility.

11. Last stop was Pershing Square
where we caught the metro back to Union Station and then caught our train back home.

For more pictures of the Soka excursion to CicLAvia, check out our album on Facebook.

While Soka students were inspired by the change of mood and accessibility on the streets of LA, others were inspired to different ends... Read about a Ciclavia marriage proposal here!

If you want to know more about the event, talk to Deike or the students in her class!

Upcoming Events for the Month of October

Upcoming Events

This page will be updated throughout the month, so keep checking back for updates! 

Click to see full size!

October is Bra Recycling Month

Support the fight against breast cancer 

and 

help divert waste from landfills! 

If you have bras that are gently used or unworn, you can mail them to the 

Bra Recyclers to redistribute to shelters and underdeveloped countries. If your bras are falling apart, send them to the Bra Recycling Agency to be pulverized into carpet padding. If you're feeling crafty and adventurous, you can try making a bra purse. For more ideas for how to reuse your unmentionables, check out this webpage. 

The Soka Instructional Garden (SIG)
Weeding Wednesdays: 4:45 - 5:45 pm every week
Garden Party Sundays: 10 am every week

On Friday the 18th there will also be a celebration of the full moon there, which means music, silliness, and some biodynamic planting! Don't know what this is? Swing by and find out!

Meetings
Sunday October 6th
Sunday October 20th
7:11 pm
Game Room

CicLAvia
Sunday October 6th
Environmental Department can no longer offer transportation for Soka students, but we still encourage you to find a way there to check it out on your own. Find the details here.

The Solar Decathlon at Irvine Great Park
The event goes from October 3rd-6th and 10th-13th
Friday the 11th is the career fair. On Saturday the 12th there will be a bus leaving Soka at noon and returning at 3:30 pm. Waivers must be submitted to Yona by Thursday the 10th. Details can be found here.

Keeep It Wild 

Saturday the 19th

It's down at the canyon's official entrance off the road that's the short cut to Alicia: technically a walkable distance if you're willing to get up early.You have to arrive by 7:50 a.m. in order to be able to start working at 8:00 a.m. since you have to sign a waiver with the rangers each time. Chelsea and Masae are both willing to drive--first come first serve!

Community Symposium 
on Decommissioning SanOnofre

Saturday the 19th

1:30-4:30 pm

For more information check here.

LA Green Festival
Saturday the 19th and Sunday the 20th
The cost is $10 for a day pass. We are not providing transportation, but we recommend taking the metrolink out of Laguna Nigel if you are interested. Find more information here.