solar panels

A Solar Decathlon -- while it might sound like some sort of torturous track and field event planned for the 2008 Summer Olympics (which is looking pretty green, too), it's really a green design-build competition that starts tomorrow on the mall in Washington, DC. Every two years student teams compete in The Solar Decathlon to see who can create the most energy efficient solar house.

While the event is primarily about good design and utilization of solar power, it's also about solar publicity. The homes are open for touring every day of the contest (except next Wed., the 17th). Here's the schedule of events.

As Inhabitat reported today, the second prize winners from 2005, Cornell's David Wax, Emile Chin-Dickey, Stephanie Horowitz, Benjamin Uyeda, and Jordan Goldman, actually launched their own green design firm following the success.

In other words, this contest leads to real world solar power implementation. So, mark your calendars: Winners from this year's contest will be announced on Oct. 19th at 2pm.

Want more info. on solar panels? Check out the Solar Panel video we recently posted.

Image via Kaye Evans-Lutterodt/Solar Decathlon

Yesterday, we met with Maverick, a guy who builds solar powered "everything" and does it as a hobby! He even has a solar powered lawn mower, and we couldn't help but ask what his house must look like :-). Anyway, we were at the Alternative Energy Meetup to learn about solar water heating, and though it was just us three, it was a greet meeting with lots of free information. The guy is an engineer who likes to build solar power projects, and the topic for the day was solar water heating.... READ MORE

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