UL will be one of 20 universities from around the world competing over the next two years to build an affordable, self-sufficient solar home, organized by the U.S. Department of Energy for its fourth annual Solar Decathlon competition.
The project is uniting teachers and students in UL's School of Architecture and Design, and colleges of Engineering and Business. They'll partner with Begneaud Manufacturing and Louisiana System Built Homes in St. Martinville, which was recently endorsed by the insurance industry as Louisiana's only builder of "fortified" homes that go above basic standards for storm safety and energy efficiency.
Forty schools applied from the U.S., Canada and Germany to the DOE's Solar Decathlon competition, which started in 2002. It complements President Bush's Solar America Initiative, which aims to make solar power cost-competitive with traditional forms of electricity by 2015.
"This project epitomizes the university's mission: serving the public," said Mark Zappi, dean of UL's College of Engineering. This is one of many renewable energy projects that Zappi's college has begun pursuing within the past two years. Work on biodiesel, ethanol and synthetic gas is also under way by engineering students and faculty.
"A new mission for us is to utilize the gifts Mother Nature gave to Louisiana - the sunlight, our ability to grow and work the land ... and turn Louisiana into a leader in all forms of energy, not just petroleum."
UL's team will call its home BeauSoleil, which means "Beautiful Sun" in French. While previous schools have built homes for the Decathlon with a blank checkbook, the UL team will focus on making its home a truly affordable prototype for new housing in Louisiana. The state's median household income in 2005 was $36,729, and assuming that increased to $40,000, the maximum cost that's affordable would be $100,000, according to UL's report.
The average Solar Decathlon house size has been 700 square feet, so the average cost would have to be $143 per square foot to be affordable. The team says a prototype goal can be twice that, or $286 per square foot, to achieve market viability.
Students and faculty will spend the next two years designing and building, before the homes are moved to Washington, D.C., in fall 2009 for judging. Set up in a "solar community" in the Washington Mall of monuments, the decathlon judges the architecture, engineering, market viability, communications, comfort, appliances, hot water, lighting, energy balance and transportation. The house must produce enough electricity to run on its own, and enough excess to power an electric car.
The competition also requires teams to cook dinner for neighboring homes. UL Associate Professor W. Geoff Gjertson said his team would "wrap that contest up easily" with a pot of gumbo and a nice Cajun spread.
The 20 schools selected for the competition are Boston Architectural College/Tufts University, Cornell University, Iowa State University of Science and Technology, Missouri University of Science and Technology, The Ohio State University, The Pennsylvania State University, Rice University, Santa Clara University, Technische Universitat Darmstadt (Germany), Universidad de Puerto Rico, Universidad Politecnica de Madrid (Spain), University of Arizona, University of Calgary/SAIT Polytechnic and Mount Royal College (Canada), University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign, University of Kentucky, University of Louisiana at Lafayette, University of Minnesota, University of Waterloo/Ryserson University/Simon Fraser University (Canada), University of Wisconsin-Milwaukee, Virginia Polytechnic Institute and State University.
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Bob Moser
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UL begins solar house race
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UL Student Government Association donates BIG to Beau Soleil House
UL SGA Donates Big to BeauSoleil Project
