Tufts students host Earth Day with groundbreaking ceremony for s...( BOSTON and MEDFORD/SOMERVILLE Mass. ...)

BOSTON and MEDFORD/SOMERVILLE, Mass. -- A collaborative team of student designers, engineers and planners from the Boston Architectural College and Tufts University will use Earth Day as an occasion to unveil their vision of innovative sustainable living, a house that will be solar powered, attractive and affordable. The Earth Day ceremony will begin on Wednesday, April 22, at 11:00 a.m. at Sophia Gordon Hall at 15 Talbot Avenue on Tufts' Medford/Somerville campus.

The 800 square foot sustainable house being built on the grounds of Tufts University is a joint effort between the BAC and Tufts. Their groupnamed Team Bostonis competing against 19 other teams from the United States, Canada and Germany in the 2009 Solar Decathlon sponsored by the U.S. Department of Energy. Team Boston, the only entry from New England, formed last winter after a rigorous selection process by the DOE, which has provided each team competing in the bi-annual event with $100,000 in grant money. Project costs will be significantly greater than the DOE grant and Team Boston is actively fundraising to makeup the difference.

Labeled as Curio House, Team Boston's design is both innovative and affordable. The project draws upon the strengths and expertise of both institutions. Students from the BAC contribute expertise and training as designers with a focus on sustainable building concepts. Tufts' students are able to draw on the university's ongoing research into sustainability and green technology through the Tufts Institute of the Environment and the School of Engineering.

Curio House's technical innovations include a new way to harness energy from the sun. In conventional systems, solar energy flows from several photovoltaic panels to a single, centralized inverter that converts the DC power into usable electricity. Team Boston will attach micro-inverters to each individual panel and use them to track energy output th
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