Follow-ups and other items

• Meir Ukeles of Israel Cleantech Ventures pointed me to a recent Merrill Lynch Europe oil and gas industry report, where they declare that renewable energy is moving to the "centre stage" for the big European oil giants. It's a proprietary research report, so no link, but if you can find a copy, it makes for a very interesting read.

• Had a very enjoyable and entertaining dinner with several GM execs and green policy thinkers (all brought together by Joel Makower -- thanks, Joel!). A wide range of topics were discussed, some pointed questions were asked, but from the cleantech investors' perspective, I would boil down the key takeaways to: a) GM is serious about promoting the use of ethanol, as their recent market campaign demonstrates, potentially providing a strong voice for that cleantech market; b) when asked about their biggest unmet technology needs, it was interesting to hear the clear response "better batteries!" for hybrids and other vehicles, with hydrogen storage also mentioned secondarily, as GM has a stated plan to target PEM fuel cell vehicles in a post-hydrogen highway world (no word on the expected timing of that, of course...). The full conversation was much richer, naturally, it was an interesting dinner all around, but those two points stood out to this investor.

• Cleantech investor Michael DeRosa, formerly of Cordova Ventures, has joined DFJ Element as a Managing Director. Congrats!

• Regarding the recent column here on ethanol IPOs, Neal Dikeman has put up a very thorough, valuable analysis on CleantechBlog, check it out. Notable quote: "...at the end of the day, it is a refiner, not a tech company."
  

• Finally, a small administrative note: I'm not going to allow any more comments in any way related to XsunX. So you day traders can stop alternately promoting and trashing the company, no more comments will be posted here. Apologies to everyone else who may have been sincerely interested in sharing thoughts on the company, I hate having to reach this point, but there we are...