If you could track the proliferation of self-powered homes back to one grassroots seed it would undoubtedly be Home Power magazine – the Bible for do-it-yourselfers committed to producing homegrown energy from solar, wind, and small-scale hydropower, and retrofitting their homes with efficiency measures. Read by off-gridders and city-dwellers alike, the magazine has been around for nearly two decades – since 1987 – and can safely be called a trend-setter.

It's no secret that China's economy is ballooning, and so are its energy demands. The government literally can't install power plants fast enough. At least one major coal