The LA Times has an in depth article regarding Hawaii and our push to go green. Some interesting snippets about the Big Island:

Take a ride in Ron Baird’s pickup truck along the volcanic shore of Hawaii’s Big Island and he’ll show you an inventor’s wonderland.

On one parcel of this government-created energy laboratory, rows of mirrors shine white-hot in the sun, turning heat into energy. On another, brown water tanks harbor strands of algae that will be made into fuel. Nearby is a wind turbine whose blades spin parallel to the ground.

“It’s an awesome amount of things going on here,” said Baird, chief executive of Natural Energy Research Laboratory of Hawaii Authority, which is helping to nurture 42 green private-sector businesses on 877 acres of land in Kona…

The Big Island’s grid already obtains about one-third of its power from renewables, Rolston said, including solar, wind and geothermal. It’s also at the forefront of some of Hawaii’s biggest experiments, thanks in part to the Natural Energy Research Laboratory of Hawaii Authority….

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