CTU in Prague has taken part in the prestigious international Solar Decathlon Competition for the second time throughout its history

FIRSTlife is the name of the project that the CTU student team is entering in the Solar Decathlon Europe 21 Competition, which focuses on sustainable, efficient and innovative construction with the use of renewable energy sources. It fully responds to the given assignment – to address the issue of a limited capacity and quality of urban housing, including its town-planning contexts. The project supervised by the Faculty of Civil Engineering CTU in Prague and supported by the University Centre for Energy Efficient Buildings CTU (UCEEB) elaborates the topic of “Renovation and Extension” applying it in the context of increasing the capacity and quality of student housing. The team of students has chosen the Větrník Student Dormitory in Prague as a model building. The project is running under the auspices of the CTU Rector doc. Vojtěch Petráček, the Ministry of Foreign Affairs of the Czech Republic and the Czech-German Chamber of Industry and Commerce.

Although the students have chosen a specific model structure, it is a concept applicable to any building with a similar typology. At the same time, the layout plan allows for the building’s adaptation to fit another target group, such as an old people’s home or housing starts for the young, in the event of a change in the social and demographic conditions. The design uses a modular prefabricated system, which speeds up the building process and thus shortens the time when the site as well as the residents of the existing building are affected by the construction.

The core of the student team working on the project is comprised of more than 35 students from various branches of Bachelor, Master and Doctoral degree studies (mostly at CTU – Faculty of Civil Engineering, Faculty of Mechanical Engineering, Faculty of Architecture), but also includes students from Charles University, Masaryk University and Czech University of Life Sciences Prague. The team can rely on the support from the teachers of the participating faculties and researchers from UCEEB, who will act as their consultants during the project. The students should not only design the dormitory extension but must also build a so-called Habitat Demonstration Unit (HDU) – a representative section of the entire extension project – and, moreover, operate it during the competition and public shows.

The CTU Rector, Vojtěch Petráček, has met the part of the team which is currently completing the demonstration unit design at UCEEB premises to become familiar with the output of the planned project.

The students are expected to complete the construction next year in spring, and the Competition finals will be held in Wuppertal (Germany) in June 2022. In the finals, they will compete with the houses designed by another 17 teams from Europe and Asia.