It is not difficult to tell where Kris Selzer lives in the Lobird Subdivision. The arrays of photovoltaic cells attached to the roof set his home apart from its neighbours, and hint at the high-tech systems inside.

Walk inside and you understand why Selzer describes his home as the most expensive trailer in the Yukon. He has spent about 40,000 dollars on solar technology to power his home, and the equipment lines the walls of his shop.

A solar hot water system takes up most of one wall, providing radiant heat in the floors as well as hot water. Digital displays flash from an assortment of boxes mounted on the walls, and banks of batteries are stacked on the floor.

Selzer designs and sells solar power systems, and sees great potential for this alternative technology in the Yukon. But there are also challenges, and he uses his home as a research and development laboratory for testing which solar devices are cost-effective and which ones are just high-tech toys.

"The equipment does not always do what it says it does," he says. "They all have different features, so I try things out to see if they're worthwhile."

Right now he is in the process of rewiring his house, so that he can add even more solar equipment to it. He hopes someday to sell the energy that his system produces back to Yukon Electrical.

This grey February day demonstrates why solar power has its limits as a year-round energy source in the North. One of his digital displays confirms what Selzer already knows; right now his power is coming from the electrical grid, not from the photovoltaic cells on his roof.

Selzer still gets a monthly power bill from Yukon Electrical. His stove, refrigerator, and the outside plug-in for his block heater run off of energy from the electrical grid.

But Selzer is not trying to sell solar systems to his neighbours or anyone living close to a power line. Since solar energy costs on average ten times as much as energy supplied by a power company, most people interested in this energy source live a long ways from town.

Clean, quiet solar power is a more attractive option when your other choices are running a generator or spending about 20,000 dollars per kilometre to extend a power line to your property.

Selzer's background somewhat parallels the history of the solar industry. He played around with the technology while in college in the 1970s. In those days solar energy was a novelty; it was seen as having great potential if the costs for basic components like photovoltaic cells could be brought down.

These silicon cells convert light or solar radiation directly into electricity. Production costs began to come down about a decade ago after oil companies began to invest in solar research, recognizing that solar power was more than a fringe technology. Now British Petroleum runs the world's largest solar company.

Selzer installed a solar system in his home in 1992. He wanted a back-up energy supply as frequent power outages were interfering with electrical experiments he was conducting at home.

But soon he started to see that there was an untapped market in the Yukon for this renewable source of energy. A few years ago he quit his job as an installation technician for Northwestel and started his solar energy company.

The Yukon Energy Company is also exploring how much demand there is for solar energy in the territory as part of the Yukon government's Green Power Initiative, which promotes the use of renewable energy in the territory. Yukon Energy asked Selzer to produce a portable photovoltaic unit, called the Solar 2000 Power System, as a demonstration project.

It is now being tested at the Mile 9 dump on the Carcross Road where it will be used to provide power for the dump's office. The small shed has photovoltaic panels attached to the outside, and enough room inside for both the photovoltaic equipment and a gas generator that can serve as a back-up source for power.

The prototype Solar 2000 cost about 25,000 dollars to build and could provide the electricity for a small to medium-sized house. YEC has conducted a survey to evaluate how many rural Yukoners are interested in solar energy as an energy option. The initial results show that many rural Yukoners are interested in using solar energy, but want a system that provides more power than the current model.

Building more powerful units is not a technical problem; it just costs more money. Last fall Selzer installed a portable unit at a new wilderness lodge on the Teslin River that puts out four times as much power as the prototype. The 55,000 dollar cost includes a back-up gas generator.

Selzer estimates that solar energy will provide about 40 percent of the power needed at the lodge, where the luxuries include four Jacuzzi hot tubs. The alternatives were paying as much as 80,000 dollars to connect to the grid, or constantly running a noisy generator that would disrupt the quiet surroundings.

Selzer is the first to acknowledge that when you depend on solar power, you must pay more attention to how you use energy than when the grid is supplying your needs. His new electric kettle is a perfect example. It uses 200 more watts of energy than his old kettle, and he notices the difference.

"If I make five cups of coffee a day, that means I'm using up to one kilowatt more energy per day. At the end of the day it's quite noticeable," he says.

But then again, Selzer pays infinitely closer attention to his energy use than the average Yukoner. Every Sunday morning, he takes readings from all of his various meters and devices to determine how well his systems are performing. He says it is always a thrill to see the numbers.

"This is what I do," he explains. "I live, eat and breathe this stuff. It's interesting. It's fun."

For more information on Green Energy options in the Yukon, contact the Green Power coordinator at the Yukon Energy Corporation at (867) 393-5309.