The house of the future? It’s a Honda. - house battery

DAVIS, Calif. —
Susan O'Hara and Stuart Bennett don't have flying cars in their garage, and there are no robot servants waiting to get slippers and martini when they get home.
But O'Hara, Bennett and their experimental site for nine peopleyear-
The old twin daughter live is designed to give researchers the opportunity to move forward in the coming years.
The idea for the future is that homes will not leave a carbon footprint because they are close to 100-
Consists of materials from sustainable sources and a percentage driven by the sun.
The rules here are electric cars, but no exception.
This is a post-modern house-with the shed-
Style roof lines and lapstrake wall panels in this central California town-
What you can't find in a nearby market segment: ● The house uses recycled wood to decorate and furniture, as well as recycled nails.
Even concrete is sustainable.
Foundation and polished concrete floors contain volcanic ash to reduce the amount of Portland cement used.
It takes a lot of heat to produce Portland cement, so it produces a lot of carbon dioxide.
● The House has the same type of circadian rhythm
Rhythm lighting used on the International Space Station.
It lights blue in the morning and orange in the evening.
The lighting in the bedroom creates a warm tone that helps to relax the family before going to bed.
● This is a California house, which is designed to take into account the state's high environmental protection and water protection standards.
Runoff water enters the biological sewage of the property, avoiding the sewer that eventually flows into the Sacramento River.
The collected runoff was used to water the plants in the yard, saving fresh water in this droughtravaged state.
All the energy of the house comes from the sun, but is still connected to the grid.
In a pinch, an electric car parked in the garage can power the house.
O'Hara, 49, said: "We registered here for a year and we really want them to let us stay because we don't think we can go back to the normal house," whose 12-
One-month accommodation is scheduled to end on October.
The project was driven by Honda Motor, an unlikely manufacturer.
Honda's sustainable home design tour began in 1946, when Soichiro Honda, the company's founder, had the idea of installing a small engine on a bicycle.
Honda has been working on green housing at demonstration sites in Japan for years.
Demo house in Japan uses a small engine that generates electricity from natural gas.
The heat generated by the engine is captured and used to warm the house.
In the international market, the system is called the "micro-thermoelectric joint system ".
"There are more than 130,000 units in Japan, most of which are made by Honda.
Now, with Honda smart home on the market in California, the company is looking to further drive the sustainability campaign.
One of Honda's requirements for the study is the subjects required to use the vehicle regularly.
The project provides a fully electric four for O'Hara and Bennett
Honda flew the door.
One purpose of the project is to prepare for the wider use of sustainable housing and vehicles, and to examine how this will affect the country's aging power grid.
"We already have a demo room in Japan, in this demo room ,[in Davis]
We really want to focus on the energy management side of things, the vehicle side of things, and "how will it fit into the house ? "?
Michael conig, mechanical engineer and project leader at Davis House, said.
"Honda is interested in the ability to manage and dispatch energy," Koenig said . ".
"We want to be part of the solution.
"The house is in the West Village of the University of California, Davis, which is the largest planning network.
Zero Energy Community in America.
Housing prices for teachers and students are below or below market prices. The research-
Heavy Duty community supported by private
Including a public partnership of $7.
5 million grant-
Zero Energy System
The residence is located at the end of a short street without close neighbors.
There is a small visitor center on one side of the house and a garage on the other to enter through the connected open corridor.
The visitor center reminded people that the house was not only being monitored by Honda engineers, who viewed Energy Statistics from remote areas, but also by people.
"We have a lot of people who don't know that the House is not open to the public coming to the door and when we are still wearing bathrobes, they will come in right away," said Bennett, 45, he did more actuaries in saraman.
"So it's kind of like living in a fish tank.
"The family won their stay at home by answering an invitation from the University, a supporter of the program and a supporter of Pacific Gas and electricity.
O'Hara said they did not pay the rent, but the charge was "well below the market price in the region ".
The House is expected to last three years of residence and observation.
Inside, with high ceilings, modern design and furniture, it feels comfortable, cool and spacious.
The appliances are high-efficiency.
The house is heated and cooled by the radiation system under the floor.
The home controls lighting and temperature, installs three iPads around the home, and installs an app on Bennett's iPhone.
"When you open the door, the lights are on," said O'Hara, executive director of the University's School of Education.
"There are a lot of different places in the House, in a positive way.
The House reacts to you.
"The customized circadian lighting system not only automatically adjusts the lighting level in the room, but also automatically adjusts the color temperature of the light.
The lights of the night tilt towards orange and red to make it easier to see in the dark.
The house is programmed to allow itself to sleep before going to bed by closing the blinds and adjusting the lighting.
O'Hara said it sometimes conflicts with having two children living at home.
The girls, who are in the woods and Saba, "tend to undo what we do," she said ".
"If we sleep the house later in the evening and the lights are all dark, the children will go and press the controller and turn on all the bright lights.
But don't care about those fancy things.
Bennett's favorite feature is more popular than futuristic. “We have a 65-
"There is an inch flat screen TV on the wall of the living room with the best remote control in the world," he said . ".
O'Hara says she loves the lighting, heating and cooling floors and the basic layout and design of the house in the future.
"It's exciting to stay at home," she said . ".
The California House gives the engineers a real one.
Time to see how the increased use of solar energy poses a technical challenge to the country's old energy infrastructure. Plug-
In hybrid and pure electric vehicles, the grid is affected, a one-way power supply system conceived in the 1800 s.
If 10,000 households have a rooftop solar collector to power the grid, what happens when the sun falls behind the clouds? A massive drop-
There was a power cut.
If 10,000 people with electric cars go home at 6: 30m.
Then plug them all in and charge, what happens?
Huge demand for electricity.
Problems like this provide the project engineer with the opportunity to find a solution.
"As the number of grids --
There are more and more connected roof solar installations, and monitoring the two will become more and more important.
The way electricity flows, "said Dan T.
Assistant Secretary of the United States, Ton. S.
The Department of Energy is closely following the project.
In another key area, houses and cars are far ahead of the market:
The electric cars in the solar house are still powered by a power grid that relies mainly on coal, and the carbon is completely out of the picture of the California house.
Adding a battery backup system to the House provides additional layers of redundancy and is flexible to store power when the sun is not on.
The brain of surgery is family energy-
Management System.
What Honda calls "HEMS" is computer hardware and software designed to improve the house and its connection by cutting off the power supply to the grid when needed, charging the car battery, when the house production exceeds the need, charge the house battery and send the power back to the grid.
The system "monitors where energy should go and which energy should be used," said Bennett . ". The energy-
Management System and household battery stand in glass
Closed Area of garage.
HEMS is the size of a high metal locker with a light shelf.
Although the front is metal, not glass, the battery is like an oversized wine cabinet.
The biggest obstacle to bringing future homes to the present is that "regulatory policies and utility pricing structures need to catch up with the technical level to fairly compensate homeowners for the benefits of home energy for the social and grid-
"The management system is available," said Honda spokesman Matt Sloustcher . ".
"In areas like California where there are positive renewable energy targets, the regulatory process is already in progress," Sloustcher said . ".
Scott Sors and Marcy Geffner are free writers.
Geffner reports in Davis, California. lif.