This Solar-Powered House must be taken directly from the future all while being controlled with Xbox Kinect!
The students at SCI-Arc and Caltech have designed an entirely solar-powered house that is clean, green, and energy-efficient. It’s also remarkably easy to use because it is controlled by Xbox’s Kinect motion controls.
The 750-square-foot, net-zero home features a quilted exterior—fittingly compared to that of a spacesuit—where insulation is stretched around the frame rather than stuffed inside it. The house took two years to build with more than 100 students helping and $1 million to build. It would cost $300,000 to replicate the structure, including materials and labor.
The Compact, Hyper-Insulated Prototype Solar House (CHIP) has an Xbox Kinect for a master command center that lets residents tweak lights and shades using basic gestural movements, like pointing and sweeping their arms. Too forgetful (or just plain lazy) for that? The house has a 3-D camera that can track your movements and automatically switch off the lights behind you.
The point is to streamline the complexities of home-energy management–to present them in a centralized, intuitive way. In this case, flailing your arms around is way easier than trying to figure out your standard gajillion-button energy monitor.) “Further developments of this technology are underway which include the controlling of all electronic equipment, the appliances, and the climate control of the home,” project manager Reed Finlay tells Co.Design.
