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Near North Apartments
Located near the former site of Cabrini Green, Near North Apartments is a single room occupancy building that has dedicated half of its 96, 250 sq foot units to the homeless and disabled. Helmut Jahn designed the SRO to have reduced operating costs by taking advantage of solar and wind energy and through the utilization of water runoff.
The eight turbines, designed at the University of Illinois, with the city-donated photovoltaics are expected to generate 15% of the total building power. Furthermore, runoff is collected in an underground cistern and used for flushing toilets and irrigation. USG, a construction material supplier for the project, will be monitoring energy savings on the structure in the future. They are expecting a total energy savings of 22% and a 16 to 18 year payback.1
1. Building Design and Construction, "Green Design Makes it to Affordable Housing," http://www.bdcnetwork.com/article/CA6433876.html.
Photo by Whitney Parks
Photos by Whitney Parks
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Wind energy is not a new technology. As early as 200 BC simple windmills were used to pump water in China and vertical axis windmills were used in Persia and the Middle East to grind grain. The Dutch reinvented the windmill after the 11 th century to drain water from marshes and lakes. The 19 th century brought the technology to America where it was used largely for pumping water and creating electricity on farms and ranches. |
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The possibilities for using solar energy are limitless. At a basic level, solar energy can passively heat and provide light for buildings, distill water, and cook food. Active strategies, incorporating photovoltaics, pumps, and fans to change energy outputs, generate electricity, heat water, heat and cool buildings, and power cars, boats, and even planes. Solar electricity is produced by converting sunlight into power using the photovoltaic effect where an electrical current flows though a solar cell when the cell is exposed to sunlight. Read More... |
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Sharp Solar, located in Huntington Beach, CA, began researching solar cells in 1959. “By the end of 2007, Sharp reached 2 gigawatts of cumulative solar cell production volume, more than any other company in the world.” Sharp has developed a range of options of photovoltaic panels including off grid modules, residential modules, commercial modules, utility scale modules, and a new line of thin film photovoltaic modules. |
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Suntech Power, founded in 2001, is an international manufacturer of photovoltaic modules with sales offices and installation partners in North America, Europe, Asia, and Australia. Suntech’s America is located in San Francisco, CA and their corporate headquarters is located in China. Suntech has developed a range of photovoltaic options including their monocrystalline solar panels, polycrystalline solar panels, semi-transparent modules, and building integrated photovoltaic (BIPV) panels. |
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