My Clean Break column today takes a look at a Toronto-area company called Martin Air Systems, which has developed a system for capturing waste heat from restaurant kitchens and reusing it to help heat the entire restaurant and its incoming municipal water. Jeff Martin, co-founder and president of the company, says early results with a number of SIR Corp. restaurants (Canyon Creek, Jack Astor’s, Alice Fazooli’s) show up to an 80 per cent reduction in energy use related to building and water heating. On new restaurants, he said the system has a one-year payback, while on retrofits the payback is two to three years, depending on the size of the restaurant and how busy it is.

My Clean Break podcast today is an interview with Kory Teneycke, executive director of the Canadian Renewable Fuels Association. On Jan. 1 it becomes mandatory for all gasoline and diesel sold in Ontario to contain a minimum 5 per cent blend of biofuel, such as ethanol or biodiesel. Teneycke tells us whether Ontario can handle the expected demand from local supply and addresses some of the criticisms attached to ethanol production, such as its anticipated impact on food supply and its allegedly poor return on energy input. The interview covers a lot of ground and offers a good update for the situation in Ontario.

If you’re curious about how Google is going about installing its 1.6 megawatt solar system, Wired.com has a story and some cool pictures showing how panels are being used in parking lots to provide coverage for cars while generating electricity for the company’s headquarters. “About a third of the 9,000 solar panels Google’s installing will take the form of overhanging parking shades at the million-square-foot campus in Mountain View. The others will be mounted on rooftops,” according to Wired.com.

Link to the article and check out the photos. They’re pretty cool.

Shares in Dynamotive Energy Systems (OTC-BB) jumped 14 per cent today after it was disclosed that a senior Chinese state agency, apparently in a rare move, endorsed the company’s fast pyrolysis technology. “China’s National Development and Reform Commission, a management agency under the State Council which studies and formulates policies for economic and social development, recommended after a year long review the promotion of Dynamotive’s BioOil technology as a means to increasing energy security and independence,” the company said in a statement.

A team of seven officials from China visited Dynamotive’s West Lorne facility in Ontario as part of the technology review. Seems they were impressed with what they saw.

According to an English translation of the state agency’s report and provided by Dynamotive, the company’s BioOil has “strong potential” as a substitute for fuel oil. “Analysis shows that if one-third of China’s agricultural and forestry waste could be used to produce BioOil, 15 million tons of fuel oil could be substituted, and half of imported fuel oil by China could be theoretically displaced.”

Dynamotive’s chairman Richard Lin, in an interview with Clean Break, didn’t hide his excitement about this development. “Their report is a very important marketing tool for us,” he said. “In China, if there’s any comment from the government people listen carefully. It’s like the bible.”

Lin said there are no projects in the works yet in China but at least 10 groups have expressed interest in the technology. “The potential is huge,” he said. “With all the biomass available in China, we probably could build 2,000 plants each processing 200 tonnes (of biomass) per day. That’s the kind of number we’re looking at.”

Who knows where this will lead, but there’s no denying that it’s nice to have the Chinese government as cheerleaders of your technology, particularly when China is growing increasingly concerned about its dependence on foreign oil imports amid skyrocketing demand. I just wish this Vancouver-based company would lose its bloody OTC listing and gain some market credibility through a real stock exchange.

As a reminder, I wrote a feature in the Toronto Star back in October that included a lengthy description of Dynamotive and recent developments.

Shares in Dynamotive Energy Systems (OTC-BB) jumped 14 per cent today after it was disclosed that a senior Chinese state agency, apparently in a rare move, endorsed the company’s fast pyrolysis technology. “China’s National Development and Reform Commission, a management agency under the State Council which studies and formulates policies for economic and social development, recommended after a year long review the promotion of Dynamotive’s BioOil technology as a means to increasing energy security and independence,” the company said in a statement.

A team of seven officials from China visited Dynamotive’s West Lorne facility in Ontario as part of the technology review. Seems they were impressed with what they saw.

According to an English translation of the state agency’s report and provided by Dynamotive, the company’s BioOil has “strong potential” as a substitute for fuel oil. “Analysis shows that if one-third of China’s agricultural and forestry waste could be used to produce BioOil, 15 million tons of fuel oil could be substituted, and half of imported fuel oil by China could be theoretically displaced.”

Dynamotive’s chairman Richard Lin, in an interview with Clean Break, didn’t hide his excitement about this development. “Their report is a very important marketing tool for us,” he said. “In China, if there’s any comment from the government people listen carefully. It’s like the bible.”

Lin said there are no projects in the works yet in China but at least 10 groups have expressed interest in the technology. “The potential is huge,” he said. “With all the biomass available in China, we probably could build 2,000 plants each processing 200 tonnes (of biomass) per day. That’s the kind of number we’re looking at.”

Who knows where this will lead, but there’s no denying that it’s nice to have the Chinese government as cheerleaders of your technology, particularly when China is growing increasingly concerned about its dependence on foreign oil imports amid skyrocketing demand. I just wish this Vancouver-based company would lose its bloody OTC listing and gain some market credibility through a real stock exchange.

As a reminder, I wrote a feature in the Toronto Star back in October that included a lengthy description of Dynamotive and recent developments.