Copeland Building Envelope Consulting
We solve building envelope problems.
CopelandBEC recently provided technical and financial support for a team of students from the University of Minnesota competing in the national Solar Decathlon Collegiate Competition in Golden, Colorado. We’re thrilled to report that the UMN team came away with first place in the attached housing division and the grand prize of the entire residential division! Read the full results here.
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Over the past few months CopelandBEC has been working with students and faculty advisors from the University of Minnesota (UMN) Solar Decathlon team. The UMN team is competing in this nationwide event sponsored by the U.S. Department of Energy.
The U.S. Department of Energy Solar Decathlon is a collegiate competition that prepares the next generation of building professionals to design and build high-performance, low-carbon buildings powered by renewables.
U.S. Department of Energy
Based on the UMN team’s performance in the semifinals in February, they have now advanced to compete in the finals to be held April 20–23, 2023 in Golden, Colorado at the National Renewable Energy Laboratory.
We’re thrilled to have been able to play a small role in the UMN team’s project and wish them the best in Golden! Below are some renderings of the project building, courtesy of the UMN team.
Last week I had the privilege of presenting at the 43rd annual Capital District Engineer’s Week. I talked about building science first principles that anyone can use to help solve their own building envelope problems, and shared a bunch of freely-available resources.
National Engineers Week was created in 1951 by the National Society of Professional Engineers and coincided with President’s Day. This is no coincidence, since George Washington, the 1st President of the United States was a land surveyor and engineer.
Much of what I discussed is shared right here on our site at copelandbec.com/self-help.
In case you missed it, I’ve started writing a weekly newsletter about how to make buildings work better. This week’s edition shares some of the free resources from our Building Envelope Self-Help page, and I’ve been sharing a lot of original content as well. Recent topics have included:
Check it out over on LinkedIn!
It’s 2023 and the time is right to start using color on engineering drawings.
For as long as I’ve been in the industry engineering drawings have been produced in two colors: black and white. Apparently back in the day they were blue. We haven’t come very far.
