CHIP House Takes Design to Different Heights in U.S. Department
of Energy Solar Decathlon 2011 May 18, 2011 The team of students
from the Southern California Institute of Architecture and
California Institute of Technology, otherwise known as the SCI-
Arc/Caltech Solar Decathlon team, have teamed up to take an
interesting approach to the design of their Solar Decathlon
home. Unlike the other houses the DOE Energy Blog has profiled,
CHIP—which stands for "Compact House Infinite
Possibilities"—looks nothing like a traditional home from the
outside, but if all goes as planned, it will achieve ultra high
efficiency energy use for its occupants. In what can only be
described as a truly "out of the box" approach to the design of
the home (pun intended), the SCI-Arc/Caltech team has wrapped
the polygonal home in a "skin" that acts as what the team refers
to as "outsulation." This skin is a system of cellulose-filled
batts fastened in layers to the outside surface of the roof
(underneath the home's 235-watt photovolta