A sliver bullet for the terrible climate impact of AC

Read Time: 3 minutes, 23 seconds

Hi! This is Climate Tech Today, the newsletter that highlights the solutions, companies and innovators that have a fighting chance at making a significant dent in the fight against climate change.

We are rational optimists. We believe in the ingenuity of our fellow humans to save the planet, but we evaluate those humans and their ideas with data.

In this week's email:

• A silver bullet for the terrible climate impact of air conditioning

• Cling wrap, but made from potatoes

• Carbon tracking software for the food industry

BLUE FRONTIER RAISES $20M FOR THEIR SILVER BULLET SOLUTION FOR AIR CONDITIONING'S CLIMATE IMPACT

Be warned ... this solution sounds too good to be true. Silver bullet ideas rightly raise eyebrows. But, with how obvious the effects of climate change are becoming, we need as many silver bullets as we can get!

Air conditioning usage has grown significantly across the globe. This growth is expected to continue to accelerate as temperatures continue to rise and the technology becomes available in new parts of the world.

This is bad, because air conditioning is terrible for the environment. The transition to a more sustainable solution has several challenges - Blue Frontier believes their innovative AC unit can solve all of them.

There are 4 major issues with air conditioning:

• Electricity Consumption: AC uses a lot of electricity. In the U.S. alone it consumes 6% of all electricity produced.

• Refrigerants: Air conditioning units rely on man-made chemicals to generate cooling. Refrigerants have improved over the last 100 years. The first refrigerants used had the power to directly deplete the ozone. Most hydrofluorocarbon (HFC) refrigerants in use today no longer have a direct impact on the ozone layer, but still have a high GWP (Global Warming Potential). These greenhouse gases are over 2,000 times more potent than carbon dioxide.

• Peak Demand Hours: It’s hottest in the afternoon, so everyone cranks up the AC all at once. This is very taxing on the electrical grid. Given the also intermittent nature of renewable energy availability, it's difficult to rely solely on renewable sources to keep up with demand.

• Switching Costs: Building owners have invested - particularly in the case of commercial buildings - in costly HVAC systems. Switching to a new system would have to be very financially attractive in order for owners to transition.

Here's how Blue Frontier is addressing each of these challenges (silver bullet part):

• Energy efficiency: According to Blue Frontier, the overall efficiencies in their AC technology reduces the electricity use of building cooling by 60%.

• No high GWP chemicals: Blue Frontier units use a type of liquid called a desiccant. Basically when you pass air along this liquid it removes moisture from and cools the air. By using this alternative cooling method, Blue Frontier units reduce GWP (global warming potential) by 85% compared to existing units.

• No demand surges: The liquid desiccant can also be used to store energy (mind blown). This combined with the energy efficiency means that as usage increases during peak hours, the energy demand will not overwhelm the existing grid. Which makes it more likely that utilities could meet demand entirely with renewable energy sources.

• Flexible cost model: It looks like Blue Frontier also has some innovations on the business model front. They plan to remove the heavy capital investment requirements for building owners by making their units available through what they are calling HVAC-as-a-service.

There you have it. Blue Frontier is planning to pilot their units in commercial buildings before the end of the year. As adoption for their technology increases we should get a better sense of the environmental outcomes. If you know any commercial business owners, pass this along to them! If you own a home, Blue Frontier is planning to launch a residential business.... stay tuned.

QUICK BURSTS

• Just plain cool: Last week Great Wrap closed $17M series A round. The Australian startup makes a potato-based alternative to plastic cling wrap.

• Funding Alert: Root Global closes $2.6M pre-seed round to build software to help the food industry measure and act on carbon reduction goals. The company aims to help players at each step in the chain (producers, retailers, processors, restaurants, etc.) to track carbon emissions.

Thanks for reading! See you next week!