If you happen to be in Washington this week, take a walk down to the Mall and check out the Solar Decathlon where teams from 20 universities and colleges are vying to design and build the best solar house. I strolled through it Saturday with my family and saw some pretty cool (and warm) stuff.
Modular, boxy and sometimes metallic in appearance, solar houses don’t look like anything I’ve ever lived in. It’s no surprise that the roofs are covered with solar panels. Check it out for yourself in the Solar Decathlon’s Daily Journal and Blog. And there’s a nifty photo gallery to check out plus a current list of leaders. The competition goes through this Sunday, Oct. 20.
Almost every automaker has had to 'pick a side' when it comes to alternative fuel options and ways to divest from a reliance on gasoline. Fiat is looking to back compressed natural gas or liquid propane as an interim solution.
Plastic may not be the most beloved of materials to the more environmentally minded, but Plasti 2012 aimed to mold a different opinion of the material in people's minds.
The rare earth element market has become steadily more rational, and new sources coming online will continue to reduce costs. Still, it is unlikely that prices will drop to their former lows.
Against a backdrop of mounting product complexity and a need to keep a lid on development costs, companies are recognizing a need to make simulation a more integral part of the design process. In response, vendors in the CAD world are building out CAE functionality as part of their CAD suites while simulation vendors are building tighter integrations to leading CAD tools. Keith Meintjes, Ph.D., Practice Manager, Simulation and Analysis at CIMdata, Inc., joins Design News CAD Editor Beth Stackpole in this radio program to explore the new face of integrated CAD and CAE, how companies are benefitting from this tighter partnership between platforms, and how integrating CAE earlier in the development cycle pays off in optimized product designs.
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