We hope everyone is having an excellent start to the New Year! We have some new and exciting news that we would like the share with you.

“This shit’s a hit!” – Inge Christensen, Creative Expeditions

We are extremely proud to announce that ZooShare has won the ClimateSpark Social Venture Challenge!! We won a grand prize of $40,000 from the Toronto Community Foundation and $250,000 in bridge financing from the Toronto Atmospheric Fund. Big thanks to the ClimateSpark organizers and partners, and to everyone who voted for us for helping to make this happen. We are looking forward to putting the money to good use. A press release can be found here.

Power contract offer delayed

As you may or may not have heard, the Ontario Power Authority (OPA) is currently in the midst of a review of the Feed-in Tariff (FIT) program, which is affecting all FIT applications submitted after December 2010, including ours. As a result we are still waiting for a contract offer, but are hopeful of receiving one as early as this Spring! This has pushed the planned construction date back to the Spring of 2013.

Lending a helping hand

ZooShare is lucky to be receiving assistance from a number of friendly businesses and individuals. We are pleased to announce that ZooShare has teamed up with ReiCura to assist with its marketing and communications, and Tri-Barrel Design to develop 3D models and images of the planned site – both of which are the result of generous pro-bono offers. We’re also pleased to welcome Erik Lo Forte to the ZooShare intern team. We are truly excited about all of these relationships and feel they’ve got loads of pootential!

Between the ClimateSpark victory, some much-anticipated clarity on the FIT program and our new relationships, 2012 is shaping up to be a very exciting year.