I’ve got a weekend feature in the Toronto Star that takes a closer look at car-sharing in Toronto, where two services — Zipcar and AutoShare — currently compete. I’ve also got a short story on a new car-share service starting out in Baltimore called RelayRides, which pegs itself as the first peer-to-peer car-share service in North America. Instead of owning its own fleet, RelayRides enables anyone who owns a car to sign up and make their vehicles available for short-term rental by other members of the public. It’s an interesting model that, while full of risks and very tricky to implement, could work in certain markets.

On the acquisition front, two more promising Ontario cleantech ventures have been plucked up by U.S. firms. On Tuesday Toronto-based biogas maker Stormfisher Biogas announced it had been acquired by Virginia-based Greenhouse Gas Services. Despite having one of the most boring and uninspiring names, Greenhouse Gas Services is a venture of GE Energy Financial Services and AES Corp., so it has some serious backing. The company invests in and develops projects that reduce greenhouse-gas emissions, and it then sells the carbon credits. So here’s my question: If some of the biggest Stormfisher projects are expected to be in Ontario, and since the Ontario Power Authority doesn’t appear to be letting biogas projects keep carbon credits, then what’s in it for Greenhouse Gas Services? I can only speculate that the power authority has quietly decided to let developers keep credits from methane destruction. Something I’ll have to follow up on.

And just today, Sunnyvale, Calif.-based Calisolar announced it had acquired Vaughan, Ontario-based 6N Silicon, a maker of solar-grade silicon that will operate as a wholly owned subsidiary. “In addition, $22.5 million in funding was raised from existing Calisolar and 6N investors,” the companies said in a statement. “The new funds will be used to increase capacity at the Sunnyvale, California cell manufacturing facility and expand silicon purification operations in Vaughan, Ontario.” It’s sad to see 6N fall under foreign ownership so early in its life, but the good news is that Calisolar is likely to set up some module assembly in Ontario to take advantage of the feed-in-tariff program here. Given that its solar cells will contain 6N’s silicon, the company will be well positioned to meet Ontario’s local content requirements and even supply other cell/module makers.

Finally, I have a follow to my story about Vestas and the possibility it will lay roots in Ontario. I spoke Wednesday to the company’s head of global offshore markets, who spoke highly of the Trillium projects and called the opportunity to develop offshore wind in the Great Lakes “fantastic.” He wouldn’t say if Vestas plans to establish manufacturing in Ontario — which isn’t surprising — but given the potential in the Great Lakes, the liklihood of Trillium’s projects moving forward first, and the positive policy and regulatory environment in Ontario (including the feed-in-tariff program, which offers 19 cents per kilowatt-hour for offshore wind power), all the stars are aligned and it’s only a matter of time before Vestas makes its move.

Read column here.

The Toronto Atmospheric Fund has so far signed up several public-sector partners, including Ontario’s Ministry of Transportation, Toronto Hydro, Hydro One  and the Ontario Power Authority, and smaller electric utilities and municipalities that surrounding the city are also being invited to participate. Next month, efforts will begin to start attracting private companies that would like to purchase at least one electric vehicle for their fleet as part of the program. The hope is that the buyer’s club will be set up and committed to a bulk purchase by July 1, which is when provincial incentives (up to $10,000) for purchasing electric cars are supposed to kick in.

So, if you’re in a company with its own vehicle fleet, spread the word. The more who take part in this program the merrier.

BTW: Wonder what Better Place is up to? After a big splash last January in Ontario its interest in the market seems to have faded.  Where’s the electric-vehicle demonstration and education centre it promised?  Where’s the network rollout plan and the investment timeline it was going to put together for Ontario? At least it’s making progress in Denmark, Tokyo and other parts of Europe and Asia, having just raised another $350 million.

Would love to see a trial of this size announced in Ontario, though I’m guessing something is in the works. BTW: Just to get it on the record, Tesla Motors said today it has built its 1,000th vehicle, an impressive milestone. The company, meanwhile, has its new Model S on display at the North American International Auto Show in Detroit. Tesla will start producing the lower cost Model S (roughly $50,000 after government rebates) in 2012.

The last remaining contractual milestone between ZMC and EEStor is the third party verification of delivery of a full production quality EESU that meets certain specifications outlined in the Technology Agreement between the companies. Achievement of this milestone will be announced by ZENN Motor Company via news release to all stakeholders.

Any interim sharing of information or technology between ZMC and EEStor is confidential in nature and will not be publicly disclosed. Any announcements related to EEStor’s technology that fall outside of the contractual milestone described above are strictly within EEStor’s purview to release to the public. ZMC will only comment on EEStor’s progress once the information is made available in the public domain by EEStor.

ZMC remains focused on the development of its ZENNergy drivetrain solutions in anticipation of the successful commercialization of EEStor’s technology. ZMC continues to work with EEStor on a regular basis.

So, that’s where things stand… As Chaucer wrote more than 600 years ago, “Patience is a high virtue.” Or not. I doubt you’ll hear ZENN making any more predictions of when it will receive its first EESU. Still, given the expectations it has built up over the last two years and given that ZENN’s future rests almost entirely on the success of EEStor, the company should probably be more communicative with shareholders. At the same, shareholders need to realize that with those updates ZENN isn’t making hard promises, but merely shedding light on a schedule that — as we’ve certainly learned — is difficult to nail down.

UPDATE: StephenB makes a good point in COMMENTS by parsing ZENN’s statement. It may have received an EESU, but hasn’t announced anything yet until “third party verification of delivery of a full production quality EESU that meets certain specifications.” So, technically, ZENN may — or may not — be on track. We just don’t know.

To put this into perspective, Electrovaya is still a small fry in the global battery game, pulling in less than $4 million in revenues last year. It’s also an increasingly crowded market, with players like A123, EnerDel, Advanced Lithium, Altair, Panasonic, Boston Power and a slew of others battling for electric-car supremacy. And while it has a history of touting partnerships that haven’t gone anywhere, even if just a fraction bear fruit it could elevate Electrovaya above the noise. And forget about the U.S. market, I’m talking Asia and the deals this company have brokered in India, China and Japan. Just last month it announced an MOU with India’s HEROElectric to jointly developed electric scooters and motorcycles (unlike in China, where electric bicycles are more popular, the East Indian crowd prefers scooters and motorcycles). HEROElectric controls half the market in India for two-wheelers, so it’s not such a bad partner to have. In November it signed another MOU with Japan’s Nippon Kouatsu Electric Co. to co-develop smart grid stationary battery systems based on its Lithium Ion SuperPolymer cell technology, and in late 2008 it signed an MOU with Chana International Corp., China’s third-largest automaker, to develop zero-emission electric cars. Significantly, Chana has joint ventures with Ford, Mazda and Suzuki. Electrovaya is also a partner with India’s Tata Motors as part of a joint-venture to manufacture its  batteries in Norway.

As would be expected, Electrovaya is doing a good job leveraging its own connections to India.

These are all potentially positive announcements. Problem with Electrovaya is that little is known about all these partnerships since their announcement. How is the Norway manufacturing plant progressing? Are the Chinese MOUs moving forward or have they fizzled? That the company has turned a corner by reporting profitability in its fourth quarter, and by announcing some solid revenue growth in 2009, may be a sign that some of the groundwork laid in 2008 and 2009 is beginning to pay off. Certainly a Canadian cleantech company to watch in 2010.