Drexel Smart House is a program developed by Drexel University students, and faculty to conceive, plan, develop, and occupy a former fraternity house owned by Drexel at 3425 Race Street. The goal of the program is create a living laboratory for sustainable design and smart technology. The curriculum submitted is a one-term course that provided educational information and design coordination for two student teams to complete and submit schematic designs for the DSH program.

Drexel Smart House (DSH) is a student-led, multidisciplinary project to construct an urban home to serve as a sustainable, evolving community, exploring cutting edge design and technology. Participants will explore, implement, and test the research and design of environment, energy, interaction, health, and lifestyle with the ultimate goal of improving life in an urban residential setting.

Environment

DSH plans to decrease the environmental footprint of the residents through intelligent planning, use of novel materials, and alternative energy. DSH will implement sustainable and environmentally friendly products to produce a livable house with minimal negative environmental impact.

Energy

Energy is an increasingly important issue in today’s society. People have come to realize that resources are finite. Smart House will investigate alternative energy sources, such as solar and ground-coupled, and will also utilize low energy devices and energy recovery systems. Interaction Technology should be easy to use and benefit your daily activities. Smart House will be addressing the way in which people interact with technology by improving existing and creating new methods of interacting with computers and other technologies.

Health

The importance of a healthy home is usually overlooked, yet this should be an integral part of any home design. Indoor air quality and the ability to remotely monitor one’s health are examples of projects that will be incorporated into Smart House.

Lifestyle

In today’s world people spend more time working than ever before, so it has become more important than ever to increase the efficiency of our day-to-day living. DSH will provide more efficient living and work spaces through smart design, automation, and improved computer access. Additionally, DSH seeks to achieve the LEED (Leadership in Energy and Environmental Design) Gold Certification by concurrently pursuing the 5 key areas of LEED: sustainable site development, water savings, energy efficiency, materials selection, and indoor environmental quality.

All of the LEED criteria are part of a wider DSH mission. Specific design elements considered for DSH:

• Building materials innovation aims to innovate on renewable resource applications.

• Earth cements utilize a different chemical formulation, which upon curing produces very little CO2 emission and are produced from slag, a byproduct from steel refining.

• Modular Design uses removable floor and wall panels and extra wide conduits from floor to floor and room to room to allow for new cables and wiring.

• Photovoltaic panels for solar power, placed along the roofs and sides of the home, to supplement the house DC power system.

• Solar water heating panels may use vacuum insulated panels and insulated copper lines to circulate hot water to sinks and showers.

• Biomass air filtration will use selective mosses and plants to provide natural air filtration, humidification, cooling, and oxygenation to air in the home.

• Multi-touch digital controls to interact with computers, using large screens and using your fingers to directly control everything, allowing multiple users on the same screen.

• Ceelite's LEC lights are a low power, versatile form of diffuse light, are entirely flat, produce no heat, and have no filament. They can be used on surfaces such as countertops, floors, and walls.

• Utilize controlled natural daylight to supplement artificial light in the home, using optical filters, ducts, and mirrors. The daylight fixtures are integrated with the lighting control system.

• LED lighting offers a low power, high brightness alternative to incandescent lighting.

The curriculum was successful in introducing the complex issues of sustainable design, but even more successful in encouraging and fostering interactive group design and work by the teams of students in inter-related fields – a true lab of Integrated Design. The architects led the teams in that they provided the plans, sections and elevations for collaborative work. All students contributed from the beginning, with interiors students guiding the room configurations, as well as the furnishings and finish materials. Structural engineers prepared solutions to support the intensive green roofs, to rebuild the bearing walls and introduce new interior structural renovations. The mechanical and electrical engineers planned the HVAC systems, utilizing under-floor air distribution and natural ventilation, as well as energy conservation and indoor air quality strategies. The graphics students used illustration as design tools for all team efforts throughout the project.

Sustainable design features of the projects include, among other elements:

• Reuse of the historic building and preservation of its character in the public areas

• Recycling of waste materials as part of the living arrangements in the house

• Flexibility of space use and movable partitions for future adaptation of the interior

• Use of new finish products with recycled material content

• Capturing daylight for use in interior, non-window spaces

• Photovoltaic solar electric panels on the low and high roof areas, facing south

• Green roofing with visibility and access from the second floor

• Windows, thermal insulation and efficient heating systems to reduce energy use and carbon emissions

• Water-conserving plumbing fixtures and captured rain water for landscaping

The work resulted in two outstanding team design packages, presented to the faculty and a group of guest critics from diverse fields, all with sustainable design expertise. In the fall of 2008 the Drexel Smart House Board of Directors selected Team B’s design as the basis for moving ahead. The team prepared pricing drawings and estimates were developed in December for review by the Board, and for fund raising, which will begin in 2009. Attached to this submission is the curriculum outline, including the list of students, course schedule and presentation requirements, and selected images from the students final schematic design presentation, as well as photographs of the student review session in June 2008.