Team California’s design

One of these days, the photos that I took of the Solar Decathlon will be freed from my laptop, formatted (my problem now), and gloriously displayed on this very blog. Hopefully, this will happen before the actual competition is over.

Only time will tell.

But, in the meanwhile, there is news to report: Solar Decathlon judges have announced the first winners in their multi-part competition, which will eventually judge all the houses based on their architecture, market viability, engineering, lighting design, net metering and a variety of other criteria.

The initial reviews were on architecture and market viability. Here’s the announcement:

Team California moved up to first place today from third place by winning the Architecture contest with a score of 98 points and the University of Louisiana at Lafayette‘s “Cajun-style” home, built to withstand dramatic weather, won Market Viability with a score of 97 points. Both contests were announced today and were worth a possible 100 points…

Rice University claimed second place with 95 points and Team Germany and Virginia Tech tied for third place with 94 points in the Architecture contest. Rice University also impressed jurors to claim second place in Market Viability with their affordable row house, meant to be cost effective for low-to-middle income families in Houston’s Third Ward.

Team University of Louisiana at Lafayette’s design

Images by PRNewsFoto/U.S. Department of Energy, Stefano Palter