ARCOM Supports the Solar Decathlon Competition

This past October, 20 teams of college and university students competed to design, build, and operate the most attractive, effective, and energy-efficient solar-powered house in the Solar Decathlon competition sponsored by the U.S. DOE.

This year, ARCOM was asked and enthusiastically agreed to support the competition by providing participants licenses to the MasterSpec Small Project Library at a significantly reduced rate. “I purchased a copy of the MasterSpec Small Project library so that I could evaluate its suitability for use by our 20 university teams in the development of their Project Manuals. It didn’t take me long to recognize that this is the right product for the job,” commented Mike Wassmer, Competition Manager for the Solar Decathlon. Shawna Stoddard, an ARCOM product consultant, coordinated the efforts. “This has been ARCOM’s first exposure to this competition and we’ve been impressed with the depth of experience this decathlon gives the students. It was a pleasure to learn more about the program and help provide one of the tools that assisted them in the competition. We hope to continue supporting the Solar Decathlon in the future.”

Of the 20 schools participating in the competition, six took advantage of the offer. Of those six, the University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign took 2nd place and Team California: Santa Clara University & California College of the Arts took 3rd place in the Overall Winners category.

Getting accepted into the competition is a feat in itself as more than 40 schools vie for an opportunity to participate in the decathlon. Each school submits a proposal in December, two years out from the actual event. Selection of the 20 schools is made in January, and those teams selected are immediately immersed in the competition. Kyle Macht with the Penn State team explained, “We assigned 16 ‘Project Managers’ and a core group of 40 students essential to the project, plus there were another 120+ students volunteering at different phases throughout the project. It was a huge undertaking involving 1000’s of man-hours.”

The Solar Decathlon convenes every two years in Washington, DC. It held its inaugural competition in 2002, making 2009 the fourth such event. Students and faculty at the participating schools spend more than a year and a half planning and preparing for the three-week decathlon, which consists of three major phases:

• Building: This phase includes the design and development, fundraising, and the actual construction of the home on a site on or near their campus.
• Moving to the Solar Village: In this phase, the students break down the structure and then transport it to National Mall in Washington, DC, where they then rebuild their homes.
• Competing: Teams receive points for their performance in 10 contests: Architecture, Engineering, Market Viability, Communications, Comfort Zones, Appliances, Hot Water, Lighting, Energy Balance, and Getting Around.

Timothy Hight, the faculty advisor for Santa Clara University said, “Most everything actually takes place in the ‘Building Phase.’ Our team had over 100 volunteer students with about 20 to 30 students who made up the core the group…those who were with the project from inception to the end competition.” Team California found that fund raising, design, and planning take up a lion share of the time, while the actual construction ground up to construction went quickly. They broke ground April 1, 2009 and had the shell up within two months.

Hight explained, “This project provides enormous growth for the students as they are exposed to and learn all the different skills associated design construction including negotiations, overcoming setbacks, all the real life stuff that just comes up. It involved a lot of blood sweat and tears.”

This year was team California’s second time participating in the decathlon, their first time being in 2007. Hight said, “We learned a great deal that first year and it was a big eye opener for us as we evaluated the schools that had won. One of the big lessons we walked away with was the importance of documentation. Ours documents, including the specification manual, were not in the same ballpark…actually the same county…as the winning teams. That was one of the reasons we sought out MasterSpec this time around.”

The Specifications and Drawings were due June 1st this year, right at the end of the semester and in the middle of final exams. Several teams had students putting in 20-hour days trying to get everything done for the project and academically. Hight continued, “Most of the students had never seen an actual specification and had no idea what it was supposed to look like. MasterSpec gave us the structure we needed and then the tools to manipulate the documents. It also helped the students see some questions needing to be answered that they hadn’t thought to ask.”

Asked if team California would be in the 2011 Solar Decathlon, Hight said they have decided to sit this one out. However, they are planning on implementing the competition into a fouryear program at the university as they believe it is such a valuable learning experience for the students.

For more information on the Solar Decathlon and for pictures and videos of the homes, check out the Solar Decathlon Web site at http://www.solardecathlon.org/. For the 2011 competition, ARCOM has agreed to again be a sponsor and will be providing the participants a free copy of the MasterSpec Small Project library as well as a discounted price on the 3rd edition of ARCOM’s Specifying LEED Requirements, The Best of Green from MasterSpec.