The New York Times reported earlier today that local electric car manufacturer Tesla Motors is suing Fisker Automotive, alleging breach of contract by a designer who took his trade secrets to the upstart rival. Earth2Tech pointed out that the two startup automakers are the pet projects of rival VCs, including Draper Fisher Jurvetson on Tesla's side and Kleiner Perkins Caufield & Byers on Fisker's, making for a classic Valley catfight. But that's not the only case bedeviling Tesla.

Have you already bored all your remaining friends with how many miles per gallon your Prius gets? San Francisco architect Michelle Kaufmann has the answer for you: prefab homes labeled with "sustainability facts" like CO2 emissions, energy consumption, and thermal conductivity. Be sure to note this at Mill Valley cocktail parties between swigs of your planet-killing plastic bottle of Fiji water.

A California state ballot item planned for November would secure $10 billion in bonds to begin building a high-speed rail system by 2009, with a 20-year estimated building schedule and a total price tag of $40 billion, all of it in publicly traded bonds more stable than, say, subprime mortgages. Millions have already been spent on planning — and influencing lawmakers with trips to visit Japan's shinkansen. But Governor Arnold Schwarzenegger has helped derail two previous efforts to let California voters make the decision, even though 58 percent of voters statewide support the idea. A new public-private partnership amenable to the Governator's self-interest might finally break the ice. Why should the Valley care? Here are four reasons.

When asked about his his $200 million investment in an ethanol startup in Brazil, where corruption is rife, labor standards lax and the environmental track record abysmal, investor Vinod Kohsla replied, "We have a very professional management team." Those responsible for actually cutting the cane might tend to disagree after being subjected to inhuman working conditions which some activists describe as "slave labor."

The Brazil Renewable Energy Company, or Brenco, was the target of the Brazilian Labor Ministry's slave-labor investigation unit last month. Brenco produces ethanol from sugarcane, which is more carbon-efficient than corn-based ethanol but incredibly labor-inefficient — cane farming is some of the hardest work on Earth. How did the company, backed in part by Vinod Khosla's VC firm, address this inefficiency? By paying workers less than a dollar an hour, packing them cheek-to-jowl in substandard living conditions, preventing them from leaving the unsanitary housing on their free time, feeding them poorly, and (rather ironically for an ethanol manufacturer) banning alcohol.

Today in Sacramento, the California Air Resources Board is planning to once again relax rules requiring automakers to produce more nonpolluting cars. Instead of demanding more zero-emission vehicles, the relaxed rules would call for more hybrids and higher fuel-efficiency standards, which would satisfy air-quality goals and save automakers $1.3 billion. The program originally called for ten percent of autos on California roads be emission-free by 2003. Tesla Motors is, of course, against the rules revision — but even former Secretary of State and San Francisco éminence grise George P. Shultz is in the awkward position of lobbying Governor Arnold Schwarzenegger to intervene in favor of more stringent government regulation (PDF). What is the world coming to? Oh, right. (Photo by John M. Heller)

With a laptop tracking power and gas consumption and CO₂ emissions, Google.org's four plug-in Priuses serve as a test fleet for the charity's $10 million plug-in electric hybrid vehicle research program. And according to the stats, they're already outperforming the company's two regular Prius hybrids across the board. RechargIT.org is a fantastic PR stunt, but is it good science?

The Tesla Roadster, an electric geek dream-machine of a car, is finally entering production. One of the first in line: San Francisco's own Gavin Newsom. The City's hunky god-mayor will soon be mussing his signature coiffure in one of the convertibles. It'll be just the thing to drive down 101 to scare up contributions for the gubernatorial campaign he's thinking about (read: has been planning for the last five years). The young mayor in the sexy electric car is the very picture of political virility, and he just screams "green" — in the good pro-corporate Democrat way, not the bad Green Party vice presidential candidate Matt Gonzalez way. (Photo courtesy of Earth2Tech/Katie Fehrenbacher)

Update: After the jump, Earth2Tech gets up-close and personal with the hair.

A little sunlight is a powerful thing. For a solar energy startup, SunPower doesn't seem to be a big believer in it. Deep in an SEC filing on employee compensation, San Jose-based SunPower buried the news that its COO PM Pai left the company. Forbes figures the departure has little to do with Pai or the company's performance. One source close to the company told Forbes Pai left simply because he refused leave the Philippines to move to San Jose. We know people who live in San Francisco who feel that way.

Someone named Brittney from Samantha Slaven Publicity in L.A. has written me to ask if Valleywag has a "green issue." Well, we're not a print magazine, Brittney, so that's plenty of trees, ink, and energy saved right there. But do we have a "green issue"? Oh boy, do we. Here's our green issue.

Tonight, Facebook-app developers invade enemy territory in Mountain View. Or Google tries to seduce developers over to the dark side, take your pick. For more detail, check today's Valleywag Calendar.

Al Gore, the senior advisor to Google, Apple board member, and former U.S. vice president, has won the Nobel Peace Prize for his crusade on climate change. Sure, there was that documentary. But his finest achievement, I feel, is his work in urination. Besides Apple and Google, Gore also serves as an advisor to Falcon Waterfree Technologies, a company which sells toilets that spare our earth's precious watery resources. They're installed in national parks, the Pentagon, and all sorts of other places. Whenever I unbuckle at one of these Mother-Nature-friendly rest stops, I think of Gore, take a wide stance, and smile.

We've said it before, and we'll say it again: The only green Burner is a dead Burner. This year's Burning Man arts festival in the Nevada desert has an environmental theme. But an environmental analysis has shown that more than 90 percent of the carbon dioxide spewed by Burning Man participants comes merely in getting to and from Black Rock City, the festival's temporary site. So by all means, pack up your RVs, buy that planet-destroying bottled water, and run your stereos and air conditioning all week off of diesel generators as you celebrate the greening of Burning Man. Go ahead, claim that you're raising "awareness" — at the same time that you're raising the planet's temperature. You're not fooling anyone — least of all Mother Nature.

Ladies and gentlemen, rev up your RVs, pack your SUVs full, gas up your private jets, and start making your way to Black Rock City, the site in Nevada for Burning Man, the annual art festival and orgy of self-indulgence. The most hardcore of "burners," as attendees call themselves, will start making their way there a week from now. And while you're on the road, guzzling gasoline, make sure to feel really, really guilty about all the carbon you're spewing into the atmosphere. By organizers' own estimates, Burning Man puts 27,000 tons of carbon dioxide into the air. This year, of course, they hope to minimize the impact with a "Green Man." Nonsense.

Google jumps on the Clean Tech bandwagon, joins a coalition for Green Computing. [VentureBeat]

Insert "green" pun here: the New York Times, always a sucker for the exception to the rule, steps past greenies like Vinod Khosla and the Google boys ("Oooh! We're saving the world! Look at us driving Priuses and investing in fuel cells!") and talks to Nicholas Parker, chairman of the Cleantech Venture Network.