Ryan McFarland

Years ago my family went to a scouting event on the Mall at Washington D.C. the whole area surrounding the Washington Monument was covered in booths, games, projects and everything you can imagine tht is scouting related. Right now that area has been converted to a solar powered village for the BP Solar Decathlon.

Twenty teams of students from colleges and universities have assembled their solar powered homes on the Mall. While neither of the colleges that i attended are represented (huge surprise there huh?), Penn State mustered a team - which should interest most of my family. with two out of 10 of the competitions for the even completed, Penn is in 4th place. The two previous solar decathlon’s were won by Colorado.

At this point in my life, the draw of 20 homes entirely powered with solar energy has quite a bit more pull to it than a monkey bridge and patch trading. 15 years ago that statement would have seemed impossible to utter.

I’ve seen BP’s ads on TV and even in airports proclaiming their support for the development of alternative energy. Honestly, i was quite cynical about that support until i heard about this event.

So the ten competitions that the twenty teams are battling in are Architecture, Engineering, Market Viability, Communications, Comfort Zone, Appliances, Hot Water, Lighting, Energy Balance, and Getting Around.  Some are extremely practical applications like the Appliances category - they wash and dry towels, prepare meals and even have a TV on and run a dishwasher and computer to demonstrate that an American household can be supported with the solar power provided in their project.  Some are highly subjective like the subcategory of lighting that considers aesthetics and the entire market viability and architecture competitions.

The fact that i live in a climate that is unlikely to ever be able to use solely solar power for a household doesn’t discourage me.  I think a combination of solar and wind coupled with hydro or geothermal could make many homes self-sufficient.  I don’t want to put coal miners and oil companies out of business (well, maybe i do - but gradually!) but it is wonderful to imagine living entirely off the grid.  Entirely!  They even had to power a street legal electric car and log miles in the Getting Around competition.  If pricing for these systems and maintenance of them becomes affordable i think we’ll see a swift shift to sustainable energy sources.  Battery efficiency and cost definitely are two of the major limiting factors for the average consumer right now.