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800 students from 16 countries and 3 continents brought a year’s worth a work to fruition in Versailles, France, at the Europe Solar Decathlon 2014.
The international competition is a platform for university students to apply real-world design tools and techniques to address real-world environmental sustainability challenges by designing and constructing a full-scale, functional solar-powered house.
Teams are challenged to not only demonstrate innovation and affordability in their designs, but to also take into consideration the cultural, climate and social contexts of their home countries.
After 17 days of competition, the famous Versailles Palace was transformed into "Solar City" with 20 full-sized houses of the energy efficient future constructed on-site.
As a global resource sponsor for the Solar Decathlon, all participating schools had free access to Autodesk’s broad portfolio of 3D design solutions via the Autodesk Academic Resource Center.
After earning the most points in all 10 rounds of the competition, Team RhoMe (from the words Rome and Home) from Roma Tre University emerged the winners of the Europe Solar Decathlon with Project RhoMe for DenCity.
Team RhOME celebrates being named champions of the Europe Solar Decathlon 2014.
"RhOME for Dencity is a proposal for the urban regeneration of informal settlements in the outskirts of Rome and was brought to life using Building Information Modeling (BIM) methods and software such as Revit Architecture, Revit MEP and BIM 360 Glue.
We also introduced the Autodesk BPA Certificate to students and leveraged the Autodesk Sustainability Workshop throughout the design process,” said Professor Stefano Converso, Project Manager of Rhome for Dencity and PhD and Adjunct Professor of Parametric Design at Roma Tre University.
Here is a look at other strong performances by student teams that leveraged free* access to professional 3D Autodesk design software to conceptualize, visualize and analyze their innovative housing solutions.
Team CASA UNAM from the National Autonomous University of Mexico designed a smart building system to occupy residual spaces inside the city such as empty lots, interstitial spaces within the infrastructure, and extensions to rooftops and terraces.
Team UNICODE from the National Chiao Tung University is the first team from Taiwan to compete in the Solar Decathlon. Using Autodesk Revit, AutoCAD and Ecotect software, their innovative Orchid House prototype is designed to be implemented on rooftops of existing urban housing in Taiwan to offer environmentally sustainable and affordable social accommodation to more people.
Team KMUTT from Thailand was inspired by traditional Thai architecture but designed with the flood-prone areas of south-west of Bangkok’s Bang Khun Thian district in mind. Project Adaptive House features modular units, devices designed to maximize shade and light, and water-resistant materials throughout.
Photos courtesy of Team RhOME for DenCity, Team CASA UNAM. Team KMUTT and Team UNICODE.
* Free Autodesk software and/or cloud-based services may only be used for educational purposes and are subject to acceptance of and compliance with the terms and conditions of the software license agreement or terms of service. Details and restrictions available at http://usa.autodesk.com/legal-notices-trademarks.
