It’s shameless self promotion, I know, but this is how you create awareness of books, and the point of writing Mad Like Tesla was to create awareness of the innovation going on around clean energy and the immense barriers inventors and entrepreneurs face. I also wanted to celebrate those much-needed risk takers in society, without whom we will never have the kind of breakthroughs necessary to tackle our energy demons. It’s part of the reason I write and have maintained this Clean Break blog for the past six years, without financial gain. It’s a labour of love, as time consuming as it often can be.

Mad Like Tesla: Underdog Inventors and Their Relentless Pursuit of Clean Energy was launched this month and has been well-received. The reviews so far have been positive, and awareness of the book is slowly building. But not fast enough. I want to take this moment to ask my readers, many of whom have already purchased the book (thank you!), to help spread the word. Share this link or the Mad Like Tesla website (www.madliketesla.com) on social media sites such as Facebook and Twitter. Refer to it when commenting on the various blogs you might follow. And for my media friends out there — whether in the mainstream press or the blogosphere — please consider a review, or alternatively, I’m happy to chat about the many odd and inspiring stories in this book. Please see press release here.

Thank you all for your ongoing interest and support. BTW: Many have asked, so I’m happy to report that the e-book version of Mad Like Tesla is now available at Amazon.com.

Please be patient. Thank you.

Why is Ontario the only place this happens?

You may recall back in April I wrote about an Internet company, founded by two Ontario entrepreneurs, that makes it easier for people to share a ride to events, like sports games or concerts. The service, called PickupPal, is kind of like an Internet dating service for drivers and riders. They go online, get matched up depending on where they’re going and when they need to go, then the driver and rider are left to negotiate their own arrangement. PickupPal has about 100,000 registered members after only eight months in operation, attracting users from around the world — mostly Canada, the U.S. and Australia. Ontario represents about 10 per cent of its members.

Good idea, right? Help people share a ride, get some cars of the road, reduce congestion and make the air easier to breath. Well, seems one of Canada’s largest chartered bus companies doesn’t agree. It has applied to Ontario’s transport board and is asking to have PickupPal shut out of Ontario. Their argument, to be fair, isn’t that unreasonable: they say there’s nothing stopping a van shuttle service from using PickupPal to arrange vanloads of people travelling popular routes. These vans are not properly insured and don’t meet the same strict safety standards as the bus companies. Oh, and they also cut into the bus company’s business.

But really, there’s got to be a compromise here. Under Ontario law, it’s technically illegal for a person to offer a drive somewhere to a couple of buddies and charge for gas. This just doesn’t make sense. Fortunately, the Ontario government, as a result of this story being publicized, says it is now reviewing the province’s Public Vehicle Act and hopes to make amendments that make both sides happy.

Better move fast, for PickupPal’s sake.

Google.org’s $10.25 million (U.S.) investments in AltaRock Energy Inc. and Potter Drilling Inc. brings much-needed attention to the potential of enhanced geothermal systems, and the goal of tapping geothermal heat resources almost anywhere on the plant. AltaRock is trying to perfect the process of fracturing rock, an ambitious engineering feat that would allow geothermal developers to create the necessary conditions for a geothermal power plant almost anywhere electricity is demanded. Potter is adapting drilling techiques from the oil and gas industry through the development of new drilling technology that uses high-pressure fluid to bore through hard rock.

If enhanced geothermal, or EGS, could be made economical the implications are enormous. We’re talking baseload, emission-free electricity on a massive scale that, over time, could eliminate the need for coal-fired or nuclear power plants. It would also silence the critics of renewables who says wind and solar are inadequate because of their intermittancy. Sure, perhaps all this won’t happen in a lifetime, but it bodes well for future generations who can look forward to ample supplies of solar, wind, and geothermal power and their support of electric vehicles.

Google, the world’s most popular Internet brand, isn’t breaking the bank with this investment. In fact, AltaRock announced yesterday that Google’s investment, through its philanthropic arm Google.org, is only part of a $26.25 million financing round involving Kleiner Perkins Caufield & Byers, Khosla Ventures and two other VCs. But what Google brings to this technology is much-needed public awareness. Google can make EGS look relevant and cool, as it has done for plug-in electrics and solar thermal. Google has reach. Google has clout. Google, in addition to making money, is also on a mission to drive change.

Drill for heat, not oil, is what Google is essentially saying with this investment.

So, how does Google’s investment benefit Canada? Well, to my American friends, it probably comes as no surprise that my oil-sands-obsessed country is asleep at the switch on the geothermal front. We stopped collecting data on geothermal resources back in the 1980s, and currently have zero — Z-E-R-O — power production in the country from geothermal. It’s not like there isn’t potential in British Columbia and Alberta, which shares similar geography to geothermal-rich states in the U.S. west. And as AltaRock founder Susan Petty tells me, EGS could unlock potential in eastern provinces like Ontario, just as geothermal power plants could one day sprout up in New York or Michigan where a history of natural gas drilling has shown some high-temperature anomolies.

Google Earth has a geothermal mapping application that gives a sense of the potential in these northeastern states. Drill up to 9.5 kilometres in Michigan and 2 per cent recovery of geothermal resources will get you 7,721 megawatts. In New York the yield is 10,156 megawatts. That’s at least a couple of big nuclear plants.

Again, it may take a couple of decades to make this depth of drilling economical, but bring it on.

Google Earth, as expected, doesn’t show the potential in Canada. That’s because we don’t have the data. And herein lies the Canadian angle to Google.org’s announcement: The search giant has given Southern Methodist University Geothermal Lab about $500,000 “to improve understanding of the size and distribution of geothermal energy resources and to update geothermal mapping of North America.”

The italics are my emphasis. I confirmed with the folks at Google.org that indeed the university will be mapping all of North America, including Canada. This effort is something that should be funded and overseen by the Canadian government, but since that’s not likely to happen anytime soon (we don’t even have our own monthly inventory of oil, natural gas and gasoline production/stockpiles), it’s good to see somebody else filling the vacuum. So thank you Google. When the data does become available, it will be much easier to sell the idea of geothermal development in Canada to both the public and our politicians.

It’s so silly, really, that a U.S. company is paying a U.S. university to do the work that should be funded and conducted by Canadians. Is there not any agency in Canada, any university, willing to fund and take on this analysis at home? Can we not find $500,000 (far less is probably required) to conduct an analysis of our own back yard?

I issue the challenge.

Following a study that was recently released from the University of Texas at Austin, which said livestock manure could be used to satisfy up to 3 per cent of U.S. electricity demand, I decided to zero in on the potential for Canada, and specifically Ontario. I learned that the potential was even higher in Ontario, but also learned — sadly — that the province produces less than half a megawatt from livestock manure using gas from anaerobic digester systems. This, despite the existence of a program that for the past two years has offered a premium of 11 cents per kilowatt-hour for biogas-based power production. Apparently it’s not enough.

I’ve got a feature on this issue in today’s Toronto Star if you’d like to explore more fully.

Compare that to Germany, where more than 3,700 anaerobic digester systems produce about 800 megawatts, and the situation in Ontario stinks, to say the least. Some say by 2015 Germany will have 20,000 digesters producing 4,000 megawatts. So what’s the holdup in Ontario? Red tape. Insufficient incentives. Lack of awareness or appreciation of the benefits of digester technology, which not only creates renewable power but also kills pathogens in manure that can foul up water systems. It also replaces methane emissions with carbon emissions — a 21-to1 reduction in the carbon-trading world.

Now, the rules will be under review later this year, but the Ontario Power Authority is making no guarantee that incentives will increase. That said, there’s a general sense that the red tape needs to come down. Whether Ontario — or Canada, or the United States for that matter — can realize the full potential of animal poop in power production, we’ll likely have to wait a few years to see.