I’ve got a story in today’s Toronto Star about a ground breaking on the first of many massive solar parks expected to be built across Ontario over the next two or three years. SkyPower Corp., a Lehman Brothers company, and joint-venture partner SunEdison LLC are beginning construction of a two-phase, 19-megawatt solar park about 30 kilometres west of Kingston, Ontario. SkyPower has another six 10-MW projects under development, and it’s not alone. Topping the list is California’s OptiSolar, which breaks ground on a six-phase, 60-MW solar park next month. In all, Ontario has signed contracts to purchase more than 400 MW of solar electricity for 42 cents a kilowatt-hour. Now, it’s no guarantee all of these projects will get built, but given the fact that the largest solar installation in Canada to date is only 100 kilowatts, the ground-breaking on these large parks is nothing short of impressive.

NOTE: When they’re built I’m going to have the Toronto Star charter a plane so we can take fly-by pictures and video of the parks. It’s about time we have our own images, rather than relying on the same old snapshots out of Bavaria, Germany.

I’m being bombarded with press releases — most of them greenwashing — because of Earth Day, but one announcement caught my eye. A company called EcoCab unveiled today that this summer it will launch a pedal-powered taxi service in Toronto, with plans next year to expand into other major urban centres across Canada. The launch in Toronto will involve 28 EcoCab “bikes” — which are three-wheeled bicycles with a passenger cabin that also features battery-assist, allowing the vehicle to reach speeds of 12 km/h (8 miles/hr) without having to pedal. “Able to easily navigate through congested city streets, the EcoCab provides convenient door to door service between office buildings, transit stations, shopping areas, restaurants, and entertainment attractions,” the company said.

Now here’s the kicker, and conventional cabbies won’t like it one bit: the service is free. That’s right, anybody can hop into one of the EcoCabs and get a free ride. The service is funded by do-good corporate sponsors.

Simple. Effective. My only question is if you can drive one of these things in downtown Toronto, why can’t you drive a ZENN?

Kleiner Perkins Caufield & Byers and RockPort Capital Partners have formed a joint venture with Norwegian electric car maker Think Global to bring their highway-speed, crash-tested car to the U.S. market in 2009. Kleiner Perkins managing partner Ray Lane, who is chairman of the new Think North America, called the creation of the joint venture and plans to mass-manufacture an electric car in the United States a “seminal event” along the way to zero-emission transportation. “The transportation industry is undergoing its largest transformation since Henry Ford built the Model T,” said Lane.

The Think City model is 95 per cent recyclable and reaches a top speed of 65 miles (100 kilometres) an hour. It can also drive up to 110 miles (180 kilometres) on a single charge, though I’m guessing that varies depending on the battery technology used. Think Global is working with two battery technologies: On the lithium-ion side, the car can use a nanophosphateTM system produced by A123, or a lithium manganese system from Enerdel; another option is a nickel-sodium chloride “Zebra” battery from MES DEA SA.

This announcement merely adds momentum to an exciting trend. The fact that Kleiners and RockPort are getting behind this and directly steering the new Think company is yet another sign that EVs aren’t just a passing fad. A number of startups and some of the big automakers are in a race to get the first mass-market electric vehicle to market over the next year or two. This competition is healthy, and will continue to drive the kind of battery innovation we need to truly see EV vehicles reach mass appeal.

Me, I drive a little 1997 Honda Civic hatchback. My next car will be electric — either all or plug-in. I can’t wait until that purchase day comes.

Greentech Media has a series of excellent articles today profiling a few companies trying to tap wind energy in a different way than what we see from conventional wind farms. Companies mentioned in the pieces included Magenn Power (read here), Mariah Power (read here) and Southwest Windpower (read here). Another I’ve written about the in past is WhalePower.

A big open question is to what degree any of these approaches have a chance anytime soon? The wind industry is dominated by big turbine makers who can’t keep up with demand. Wind-energy developers will buy up anything they can get, so there’s little incentive for the Vestas and GEs of the world to invest in cutting edge technologies that improve or complement their existing wind businesses. This concerns observers such as Robert Thresher, a researcher at the National Wind Technology Center, which is a part of the U.S. government’s National Renewable Energy Lab. “It’s such a sellers market right now,” says Thresher. “The market has grown, there’s high demand, and (manufacturers) are taking their money and investing in plants and factories.” Likewise, Joshua Magee, an analyst with Emerging Energy Research, says the focus for the wind industry right now is on implementation rather than innovation. He calls any improvements to existing technologies “incremental” among the main manufacturers, which are more focused on the potential for energy storage that can give their product a more baseload profile.

That said, the big manufacturers ignore these new technologies at their own peril. Both Magee and Thresher say new approaches could prove an effective way for smaller companies to break into the big boys club or for one of the big boys, through an acquisition, to distinquish themselves in a market where the products are increasingly becoming different flavors of vanilla.

Time will tell, but it’s good to see innovation taking place — let’s just hope investors can appreciate the potential.

We often get so focused on conventional solar PV or solar thermal heating that we forget about some of the other approaches out there, including one that claims to be “the fastest solar payback on the planet.”Conserval Engineering, based in Toronto, has for nearly 30 years been providing an air-based solar heating system, called SolarWall, to industrial- and commercial-scale building projects. It’s basically a special metal cladding on the south-facing side of a building that converts heat from the sun into warm air that is circulated throughout the building.

The company’s most recent installation is in upstate New York, where 50 SolarWall systems have been installed across 27 buildings at the Fort Drum military base. The company says the systems, perhaps one of the earliest examples of build-integrated solar design, will collectively produce 4 megawatts of peak thermal energy. “The technology heats ventilation and makeup air required in vehicle mainteance garages, warehouses, hangars, etc… displacing the traditional heating load,” the company said. Conserval recently expanded its manufacturing capacity in Toronto. It’s not widely known that the Canadian government, NASA, Ford, Federal Express, and Wal-Mart are among the company’s major customers.

In addition to solar air heating, the company has branched out into providing combined solar PV and air heating. It also sells its air system for agricultural and industrial process drying, which could prove tremendously useful in markets looking to exploit wet biomass. Past efforts in this area include a coffee-bean drying project in Costa Rica.