Suddenly, the U.S. military is one of, if not the, biggest real estate developers in the state.

Working through private companies in an ambitious effort to "privatize" military housing, the Army and other commands are planning thousands of new and renovated homes for their families.

This provides a tremendous opportunity to try out new ideas and new thinking. And, as a story this week by staff writer Dan Nakaso points out, that opportunity is being seized.

Nakaso reports that Actus Lend Lease, the prime contractor for thousands of new Army and Coast Guard housing units, will equip most of those new homes with state-of-the art photovoltaic cells that will pump as much as 7 megawatts of energy into the island's power grid.

Company officials say this is the biggest such project of its kind and will produce as much as 15 percent of the power needed by these new homes and other community facilities.

In addition, most homes also will be provided with solar-powered water heaters, further reducing demand on Hawaiian Electric.

This is not an inexpensive project. Officials will not say precisely how much it will cost. And were it not for the deep pockets of the U.S. military, there are doubts it would have happened.

Still, if this effort proves as successful as it promises to be, it will demonstrate that Hawai'i need not succumb to the idea that the only source of energy for its people is fossil fuel.

Once this project proves out, other developers in the private as well as public sectors should follow its lead. There is no reason why Hawai'i cannot be a world leader in mass-market alternative energy.