The best and greatest value ideas from Solar decathlon (and Central Texas!)

I'm jealous that Passive House Jake is at this year's solar decathlon.  I visited it in years past when I was stationed at the Pentagon and it's really amazing what great, innovative ideas there are out there from our university students.

This one from the University of Maryland caught my eye and I believe it's in first place so far:

"Watershed" from this year's solar decathalon - nice ideas

This drought makes me realize we must use both rainwater and grey water as smartly as possible and as you can see, this house implements the necessary technologies.

Innovative, outside the box thinking is happening here in Central Texas, too.  This weekend was the start of back to back weekends of home tours, solar tours...this weekend was the local home tour.  Saw some wonderful homes but mostly what we anticipated - traditional.  Still, one home caught both Jen and my eye in Killeen:


 Relatively simple floorplan, with a loft/4th bedroom upstairs.  This minimizes the metal roofing total square footage.

I can't say we 100% loved this home but its interesting roof - relatively low angles likely with optimum solar panel angles made me realize that there is a way to design enough "breaks" in a roof line to make a modern, contemporary home interesting without being over the top in terms of the other homes in the neighborhood.

Nice mix of limestone, metal roof.  Interesting and ideas worth implementing in our home.

Finally...this is my idea of a great "outdoor room."  Great size to take advantage of the Texas climate (well not today - we broke a record with a 106 degrees :(

Next weekend  - the family is off to Austin to round out the ideas.  

Houzz - a great App to help us say "this is what we like"

I cam across Houzz while looking at another app (Flipboard) on my daughter's iPad.  Exploring and surfing begets more discovery, indeed.

This app is great because as we see photos that best show what we like from a design or architecture, we simply add the photo to our Idea Book with a caption if we desire.

This new button to your right links you to our Houzz profile where you can see those pics.

Houzz updates with new ideas all the time so I expect our Idea Book to expand so check back often.

I think this will help a lot as we try to describe what we like to others involved with our project.

Power Idea Weekends!

Two exciting weekends to firm up ideas, and narrow down the searches for builders for CasaArey.

Next weekend is the Parade of Home, hosted by the Central Texas Homebuilders Association.  This will be a great opportunity to find local builders.  I have had not one but two people tell me not to assume that Austin-based builders will cost more.  Indeed, one new homeowner pretty assuredly said he knew it was cheaper in many cases.  Still, I'd like to find out for myself and we do like the idea of a local builder who can oversee construction instead of dropping in from time to time.  I'll report following our visits.

The following weekend in Austin are two great, simultaneous events: The Hill Country Solar Tour



 and (not associated) the AIA Austin Homes Tour.  Click the pics for links to their sites.  I'm really excited about the latter weekend because there will be lots of fresh ideas and real-world applications of solar power.   We're pulling the mobile CasaArey (i.e. a travel trailer) down to Austin as the base camp for this weekend of exploring...

Saw the most interesting home (and person) in Salado yesterday

We had the most interesting and enjoyable visit/discovery yesterday.

Long story short for this blog...Passive House Jake told us about an old friend, Stephen, from Salado, who was an "artist / builder" (and I'll add to this shortly) who might possibly put Jake's Passive House ideas into action.

We do like the idea of a local builder who can be around to supervise progress and from Jake's descriptions of his house, I was intrigued.  A google earth search later, there was no doubt I found the right house so yesterday, I figured we'd drop by to introduce ourselves.

Ashley met us on the long driveway and was extremely gracious to allow us into their great home to wait for Stephen, but Stephen showed up right away and I've got to say, I was once again just fascinated talking to another advocate for sustainable, enduring building techniques.

I think it would be safe to say finding the equivalent of Stephen's house in Austin (and read the next blog entry for more on this) might not be terribly difficult, but to find this in Salado, Bell County Texas...what a find!  Rainwater collection via a 150 yard beautiful rock way system, use of corrugated steel, absolute perfection in its south orientation to maximize use of the sun, beautiful handmade furniture from an obviously experienced craftsman father.  I really had a great time and to Ashley - I'm sorry I took up so much of a precious weekend.  I hope Stephen was as excited about my project as we are.

Stephen and I exchanged emails and phone numbers as well as the address to this blog (which does continue to introduce me to people who can help us build this project).

So just as you know "Passive House Jake," I hope Stephen is comfortable with "Artist / Builder / Renaissance (ABR) Man Stephen."  ABR Stephen had such a great working, but demonstrated in action through his own home, knowledge of energy efficient, sustainable practices.  And was quick to say what he learned and would do over again - we like that and hope to work more with ABR Stephen in the future.

...and the wood ceiling will really look nice!

Heat Pump Hot Water Heater...who knew??

http://www.geappliances.com/videos-media/?video_uuid=ylz2ud48

Jen and I just finished meeting with Passive House Jake and he mentioned  he saw this in Austin.  We're seeing more and more of this today - treating the heating and cooling of the home as a "system" instead of using up electricity to perform discrete heating or cooling. Whether it's using warm air from an AC compressor to heat water, or this pump that uses the the air in a home (like that found in a summertime Texas home!) to heat the water.  The cool air expelled from the HPHWH can cool (or at least augment the cooling) of a home and in an uber-efficient home, every bit of helping with the cooling load can go a long way.

We like that Passive House Jake is up to speed with the latest and most innovative technologies to consider.  

Here is the link to the features and more of how it works:

http://www.geappliances.com/heat-pump-hot-water-heater/electric-water-heater-features.htm

Pics really are a 1000 words

How best to describe that I like an open kitchen that opens to a "somewhat less than full formal" dining room...well, a picture helps.

Found this while waiting at the hospital today.

Passive House Jake if you're reading, please add this to my house plan.  Good use of ceiling height changes to show different rooms.  But no fireplace necessary!

Views of the lot (and our first cut at a floorplan) as we walked it with Passiv Haus Jake - Picasa Web Albums

Drop Box - Scot Arey - Picasa Web Albums:

'via Blog this'

Views of the lot as we walked it with Passiv Haus Jake.  Our first meeting with a designer and I must say it was great to hear his passion for energy efficiency.

And here is the 1st floor plan concept we forwarded to Jake tonight.  Jen and I are not firmly set on this...we want the GREAT view to the lake, in a simple, open floor plan.  Just a rough layout using the Punch Home and Landscape software.

In case you're wondering...lots of technology experimentation tonight with the blog.

Meeting with Passive House Jake today

Couldn't resist taking the pic of the rising sun against the ridge...way in the distance are two homes.  Our lot is right between them.  Beautiful view from the Corps of Engineer land.

Oh by the way, today is my first day to report to the new assignment so exercise is over. Time to take a shower.

Excited to meet Jake who I referred to in the Passive House blog.