'Solar Trees' For Google's Parking Lot

"Parking lots are the traditional wasteland of the suburban biosphere -- flat, ugly, resistant to landscaping and immune to whatever aesthetic ideals animate the adjoining architecture.

But now these asphalt acres are getting their day in the sun, with search giant Google joining other companies in planting groves of pole-mounted solar panels between the rows of Saabs and SUVs, generating clean power and providing a little shade at the same time."