If you’ve ever looked into buying solar panels or photovoltaics for your house you know how much it cost. It can be anywhere from twenty to thirty thousand dollars for a typical home. What if you could instead lease a solar system for little or no money down? That’s what some companies are doing now and it seems to be catching on. Two I’ve discovered lately that do this are Citizenre and SolarCity. Basically it’s like renting a car, but with much longer leases, you pay very little down to get the system, and you pay them a monthly rent. You are protected from utility price hikes because the cost of the solar doesn’t change and you save money over what you’d be paying without solar panels. You also don’t have to worry about maintenance if anything goes wrong, these companies cover that for you.

One thing I noticed is that neither company seems to mention the generous incentives homeowners get if they buy their own system. According to American Solar Electric’s site a 22,478 dollar system only costs 9,878 dollars after APS/SRP rebates, and Federal and State tax incentives. Depending on the financing you can get this might be the better solution. Of course if anything goes wrong with the system or a much better cheaper form of energy comes out you are stuck with those solar panels and out a lot of money. If like me you live in a location that isn’t served by SRP or APS leasing sounds like it might be a great option to save money and the environment.

I recently sent some questions via email to Casey Brooks (Marketing/Media Relations) over at Arizona Green Dining to learn more about what they do. Arizona Green Dining collects waste vegetable oil from restaurants here in Arizona and their partners Az Biodiesel recycle it into biodiesel. Here’s what he had to say:

Q) What criteria do you use to classify a restaurant as “green”?

The most significant and quickest impact a restaurant can make to the local environment is to have their used fryer oil be recycled into clean burning biodiesel. This is a abundant local renewable resource that can make a significant impact on the air we breath in Arizona. And for the restaurant it is the easiest transition to make the biggest impact on the environment.

Q) How do you use the waste oil you receive?

Our partners Az Biodiesel recycle the waste oil into clean burning low emissions biodiesel fuel to only be sold here in Arizona. For every gallon of biodiesel that Az Biodiesel makes it will take away 16 pounds of co2 emissions out of the skies in Arizona.

Q) What would happen to the waste oil otherwise?

Some of the waste oil that is too polluted to be recycled into biodiesel fuel will be used for feed stock here in Az. But unfortunately most of the used oil is being shipped out of state or even out of the country. Used waste oil is a commodity and some oil collection companies are selling it to other biodiesel manufacturers in other states. Our partners at AZ Biodiesel have committed to use the oil for biodiesel fuel to be only sold here in Arizona. Its a resource that should be utilized here in Arizona and not shipped elsewhere.

Q) What is the benefit to the restaurants, consumers, local economy, environment, and what is the benefit to az green dining?

The benefit to the restaurant is that they can take advantage of the advertising campaign that Az Green Restaurant org. has launched to increase business into these participating locations. People these days tend to favor businesses’ that are doing their part in helping the environment, so the restaurants can also benefit by promoting themselves as a environmentally friendly establishment (that should also increase their business.) The consumers benefit knowing they are actually helping out the local environment by dining at these establishments. And the consumers also benefit from the cleaner air. To the local economy: Creating jobs in biodiesel processing, fuel distribution, equipment maintenance, and many other collateral business’ associated with any industry and this is just the beginning of a new local industry. Glycerin by product is reducing costs at local water treatment plants.
AZ Biodiesel maintains the cleanliness of the restaurants oil collection area and environmentally clean accidental spills and try to use as many “recycled” collection systems (used, high quality, easy pour, fluid visible, barrels) as possible.

Q) Is the biodiesel that is produced from this oil going to be available to the general public?

Absolutely.
From the commercial supply our target market is the school bus system first and foremost. But, we definitely want to make available to all the individuals that want to be environmentally friendly. Its the community effort that will determine the size of the success and our potential to use as much local resources as possible. Its all about the public and I think people would agree on the commercial side that school bus’ first makes sense.

Q) Will any of the biodiesel be shipped out of state?

NO

Q) What is done with the byproducts of biodiesel production?

Currently, the city of mesa uses it (for free) in their water treatment plant to increase the “energy” produced. Glycerin is like a food for the microbes they grow to consume the solid waste. This will save mesa a lot of money, we expect, and we feel is the true “community benefit” that should come from it. We aren’t interested in making every nickel by selling glycerin when the community should benefit as this is really a community effort.

Q) Anything you would like to add?

Please help clean the skies in Arizona but supporting local restaurants that donate their used fryer oil to be recycled into clean burning biodiesel by visiting www.azgreendining.com

WVO Storage Tanks at Az Biodiesel – Biodiesel Mixing tanks at Az Biodiesel

Az Biodiesel should be opening soon, they have already passed ASTM specifications on their biodiesel and are currently waiting for an EPA certificate.

What else can restaurants do to be more stustainable?

• Serve dine-in customers with reusable, washable plates, cutlery, utensils, and glasses.
• Serve take-out customers with biodegradable packaging, cutlery, and utensils. Eco-Products
• Watch their energy usage. I can think of many places where it’s so cold you need a jacket to dine-in.
• Watch their water usage. Don’t unnecessarily waste water.

Interesting article over at Fox News about how the U.S. Armed forces are moving to alternative clean energies. Thanks to RKTowner for sending the link in for this.

Nellis Air Force Base in Nevada is powered by the largest solar-power array in the Americas — saving the government an estimated $1 million a year.

Dyess, Minot, and Fairchild Air Force bases purchase 100 percent of their electricity from renewable sources of energy.

Airmen and their families have been using biomass fuel at Hill Air Force Base in Utah since 2004, thanks to a 1.3 megawatt landfill gas project. In other words, they are creating gas from the air base’s trash. Complete story at foxnews.com.

Info on Nellis’ solar system.

Story on Hill Air Force Base’s biomass power generation.

Scottsdale’s PetroSun is putting into operation the first Algae to Biodiesel plant in the U.S. They will operate this facility in Rio Honda Texas. The plan is to produce 4.4 million gallons of algal oil and 110 million lbs. of biomass per year off a series of saltwater ponds spanning 1,100 acres. The biomass can be used as feed or even fermented and used to make ethanol. For more on this story head over to Gas 2.0.

PetroSun is also working with Optimum biofuels to build a algae biodiesel plant in Arizona near Coolidge. For this plant they plan to plan to generate all their own power, consume no fossil fuels, and be carbon neutral. It’ll be interesting to see how that all pans out. It’d be great if they can achieve all their goals. I don’t know their plans on who they will be selling it to, but hopefully most of it stays in state. From what I hear from other biodiesel producers here there is a huge demand from fleets in Arizona for bio. For more on this click here.

The Navajo nation has partnered up with a Boston company to build one of the country’s largest wind farms. This will be built about 50 miles north of Flagstaff in the Gray Mountain area. When completed the farm should produce around 500 Megawatts which is enough to power 100,000 homes. To achieve this much power around 300 turbines will be installed. For a more in depth article on this head over to azcentral.com.

Here’s short video of a wind turbine being erected. It’s in a totally different environment, but I’d think much of the construction is the same.