What do you get when you mix chocolate and wine? In the case of Clean Solar, Inc., you get solar. Silicon Valley Entrepreneur, Randy Zechman, is the founder of City Chocolate Fountains (the largest chocolate fountain rental company in the United States). Jeff Ritchey is a San Jose native and wine guru. He is a wine consultant for Pichetti Winery, San Saba winery, and has two of his own labeled wines. Together, they are the co-founders of Clean Solar, a Silicon Valley solar installer and integrator.

Randy Zechman will readily admit that he is a serial entrepreneur. Just over a year ago, with two successful businesses in his portfolio: City Chocolate Fountains and World 2 Do, Inc., Zechman was ready for a new challenge. Zechman and a friend of eight years, Jeff Ritchey, an award-winning winemaker, regularly attended a monthly Bay Area speaker series with a group of friends. After every speaker they would end up at a local restaurant debating the subject matter of that night’s speech, global warming and the health of the earth were often the center of those debates, which resulted in them seeing Al Gore speak at the State of the Valley conference in early 2007.

After seeing Al Gore speak on solutions for protecting our planet, Zechman began to research the solar power industry. Ritchey, while continuing to grow his label, Sensorium Wines, was also showing increased interest in the green movement, realizing that green technology was an ideal fit with his knowledge in geology, winemaking and construction.

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The Nissan Motor Co., Ltd. and NEC, a leading electronics maker, announced last Friday that they will produce ecologically friendly batteries for automobiles. The move is anchored on the automaker’s desire to catch up with rivals in the industry that have already started in green technology.

Japan’s third largest automaker and NEC are investing 490 million yen ($4.1 million; 3 million euros) to set up a joint venture by the end of this month so as to produce lithium-ion batteries for green vehicles, including electric cars and hybrids by 2009. The information was divulged by the companies Friday.

Evidently, Nissan has fallen behind Japanese rivals the Toyota Motor Corp. and the Honda Motor Co. in developing hybrids and other ecologically friendly technologies that slash gas emissions blamed for global warming. Tokyo-based Nissan has started selling hybrid cars like the Altima. Nonetheless, the automaker licenses the technology from Toyota. Hybrids switch between an electric motor and a gas engine to deliver reduced CO2 emissions and better mileage.

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