Solar District Cup 2020

Welcome to the U.S. Department of Energy Solar District Cup Collegiate Design Competition!

The Solar District Cup challenges multidisciplinary student teams to design and model optimized distributed energy systems for a campus or urban district. These systems integrate solar, storage, and other distributed energy capabilities across mixed-use districts, or groups of buildings served by a common electrical distribution feeder. The competition engages students across the engineering, urban planning, and finance disciplines to reimagine how energy is generated, managed, and used in a district.

CLASS OF 2020

The Solar District Cup Class of 2020 competed from September 2019 to April 2020. Student teams designed and modeled optimized distributed energy systems for their assigned district use case. The 2020 district use case partners were Ball State University, JBG SMITH, and New Mexico State University. 

From September to November 2019, the Solar District Cup Class of 2020 involved students and faculty advisors from 61 teams, representing 52 collegiate institutions as participating teams. These students built their portfolios with experience by developing solutions to the renewable energy needs of campuses or urban districts. 

After successfully demonstrating their progress and meeting the requirements of the Progress Deliverable Package, students and faculty advisors from 35 teams, representing 32 collegiate institutions, earned positions as Solar District Cup 2020 finalists.

The finalists moved on to compete in the second half of competition and prepared to submit their Final Deliverable Package. On April 26, 2020, the Solar District Cup held its 2020 competition event. Through a live video conference, 26 competing teams presented to a panel of judges in their district use case divisions. Each team had 15 minutes to present, followed by 10 minutes of questions from the judges.

On April 27, 2020, the third-, second-, and first-place winners in each division were announced. Following this announcement, the three first-place teams gave 8-minute presentations to a public audience, who voted on their favorite team to win the Industry Choice Award. 

THE SOLAR DISTRICT CUP CLASS OF 2020 WINNERS

Crystal Parks District Use Case Division

1st Place, Dartmouth College: This team proposed that Crystal Parks remain on Dominion Schedule 10 and install a photovoltaic- (PV) only system with a flat power purchase agreement (PPA) rate resulting in estimated savings of $273,000 over 20 years. To have 100% of their load covered by renewable energy, Dartmouth College recommended a virtual PPA in addition to the on-site PPA to cover the remaining load.

2nd Place, Colorado School of Mines: This team designed two solar solutions for the Crystal Parks district, including rooftop PV systems for all five buildings with approximately 160- to 290-kW of PV on each rooftop and an off-site PV system located at the decommissioned I-66 landfill 23 miles west of Arlington, VA, capable of offsetting approximately 100% of the district’s energy usage when combined with the five rooftop systems.

3rd Place, Cornell University: This team’s final solution achieved approximately 1.5-MW maximum (1.55213-MW, 1.940016-MWh per year) of solar energy produced through a five-building rooftop system, carports, solar flowers, and solar kiosks. The final solution also incorporated the opportunity for a 50-kW (100-kWh) battery storage system, which would provide enough power to sustain the district's emergency life systems for a minimum of an hour and a half.

New Mexico State University (NMSU) District Use Case Division

1st Place, University of Cincinnati: This team’s ground-mount PV and battery storage system was proposed approximately 1.5 miles east of NMSU’s Campus Park, near the Geothermal Substation. The system consisted of a 3.3-MW PV array and a 4-MWh battery storage system. A second PV system was also proposed, which included a 295-kW carport array with six canopies. For each canopy, 365-W monocrystalline Canadian Solar Inc. modules were selected.

2nd Place, West Virginia University: This team’s final system design consisted of three subsystems: a 278-kW fixed horizontal tilt PV array to be installed on the roof of the Corbett Student Union; a 988-kW, single-axis tracking PV array with a 405-kW/4-MWh lithium iron phosphate battery storage system located on the parcel of land next to the Geothermal Substation; and a small 16-kW solar pergola structure on the Hadley Hall field. All PV arrays make use of Canadian Solar Inc. bifacial PV modules. 

3rd Place, University of Colorado Boulder: This team’s solution consisted of 10 rooftop installations, two parking lot installations, and a small shaded installation in the quad in front of Hadley Hall. The final solar PV system for NMSU presents a 16.5% energy offset for the demand provided by the competition. 

Ball State University (BSU) District Use Case Division

1st Place, Florida International University: This team proposed a 13,632,501-kW PV system that will help to offset the energy produced on the campus by about 78%. Within the area available on the campus, the PV system utilized rooftop areas, available land, and a church parking lot to mount 32,633 panels.

2nd Place, New Mexico State University: This team proposed a comprehensive approach to integrate solar PV and battery electric storage system, solar thermal, and thermal storage system. They also made suggestions for electrification of the campus fleet, electric vehicle charging infrastructure, and added artistic solar benches in several locations throughout the campus. 

3rd Place, Creighton University: This team proposed two phases of development that included two distinct solar PV and battery systems, including rooftop PV systems on four different buildings on BSU’s campus and ground-mounted PV arrays that will take advantage of single-axis trackers on the northern section of campus. A small PV system has also been designed for the 55° south-facing wall on the architecture building, which creates a marketing opportunity for BSU.

The Solar District Cup 2020 Industry Choice winner was University of Cincinnati. Congratulations!

LEARN MORE

To learn more about the Class of 2020: 

• See the 2020 Event details, including a schedule of events and winners.
• Visit the 2020 overview page on Energy.gov. 
• Read the 2020 competition Rules, available under the Resources tab. 

To learn more about the program and the current competition: 

• Follow program updates on the main Solar District Cup HeroX page.
• Visit the competition overview and Class of 2021  pages on Energy.gov. 
• Subscribe to competition emails.
• Send us your questions.

The Solar District Cup is directed and administered by the U.S. Department of Energy (DOE), the National Renewable Energy Laboratory (NREL), and is funded by the DOE Solar Energy Technologies Office. Learn more.

GUIDELINES

The Rules document provided a framework for student activities, student team submittal requirements, and judging evaluation.

APPROACH

The Solar District Cup is designed to inspire students to consider new career opportunities, learn new industry-relevant skills, engage with the professional marketplace, and prepare to lead the next generation of distributed solar energy. The Class of 2020 competitors achieved the following:

• Built experience with innovative renewable energy design
• Developed real-world solutions that shape the future of solar energy
• Engaged with industry professionals to forge relationships and connections that aid participating students’ transition to the solar energy workforce upon graduation
• Competed to earn national recognition upon winning a Solar District Cup and/or being selected as an industry choice winner.

The Solar District Cup encourages collaboration between academia and industry. The program seeks to establish public-private partnership and demonstrate corporate and nonprofit industry co-sponsorship.

PROBLEM STATEMENT

The Solar District Cup 2020 challenge was to:

Design a solar-plus-storage system for a district that maximizes energy offset and financial savings over 20 years. 

The Solar District Cup 2020 had three divisions. Each division had at least six teams competing against each other. Each division had a distinct use case of an existing mixed-use urban district or campus interested in pursuing increased distributed energy development. The competition organizers provided each team with the details of the district use case for the division in which the team competed.

During the 2020 competition, a district use case was a defined area served by an electrical distribution feeder with a collection of buildings, open space, parking, and infrastructure.

WHAT TEAMS DID AND WON

The goal for each team was to design a solar-plus-storage system for a campus or urban district. Competitors analyzed electric distribution grid interactions and assumed the role of renewable energy systems developers to produce a power purchase agreement proposal for their division’s district.

The winning teams in each division of the Solar District Cup 2020 received a trophy and national recognition. Additionally, one team (University of Cincinnati) was identified as the industry choice winner. All student competitors gained valuable experience with real-life examples of innovative renewable energy design. Competitors learned to use leading industry software, presented to nationally respected judges, and engaged with industry. 

HOW JUDGING WORKED

A qualified panel of five judges per division, comprising subject-matter experts and representatives from the partner district use cases selected by the competition organizers, scored finalist submissions according to the judging statements listed in the Rules. The judging panel for each division selected a first-, second-, and third-place team for each division. The judging panel made their selections through a subjective evaluation based on their expertise and experience.

COMPETITION DELIVERABLES

The competition deliverables comprised a proposal similar to a power purchase agreement request for proposals response and contained the following elements:

Progress Deliverable Package – Solar PV System:

• Conceptual system design—layout, specifications, and energy production
• Distribution system impact analysis—power flow model and approach
• Financial analysis
• Development plan—building and site plan, and construction plan.

Final Deliverable Package – Solar PV + Battery Electric Storage System:

• Conceptual system design—layout, specifications, energy production, and battery cycles
• Distribution system impact analysis—power flow model and approach
• Financial analysis—financial narrative and model
• Development plan—building and site plan, and construction and development plan
• Optimization strategy narrative and presentation.

ELIGIBILITY

The Solar District Cup invited participation of teams composed of at least three students enrolled in accredited U.S.-based collegiate institutions. Students had to be enrolled in at least one class and be pursuing a degree for the duration of the competition. Students and faculty advisors were not required to be U.S. citizens but had to be legally residing in the United States at the time of the competition. Members of the judging panels, competition organizer staff, and DOE and national laboratory employees were ineligible to compete.

Although any level of collegiate student was eligible to compete, the challenge scope was intended for multidisciplinary teams of upper-level undergraduate students. Student participation could have been integrated into senior design or capstone work, counted as elective or independent study course credit, been added to the curriculum of existing classes, or be considered an extracurricular student activity. 

To learn more, please review the official Solar District Cup 2020 Rules.