☀️ July Update

by David Cohen-Tanugi on July 3, 2024

Dear Advisors,

The summer is in full swing. This month, we'll feature a new Proto Ventures project that aims to alleviate the huge strain on the electric grid from the electrification of space heating.

Happy reading,

David and the Proto Ventures team

By the numbers

Since April 2023:

• ☕ 526 ecosystem interactions
• ​🧪 82 technologies assessed
• 💡 90 venture ideas
• 🏫 6 team projects created
• 🧑 51 customer discovery activities
• 🤝 9 cross-campus conversations initiated

June highlights

🎤 I discussed key opportunities for the commercial fusion ecosystem in a podcast interview with the Insider's Guide to Energy, alongside Kyoto Fusioneering co-founder extraordinaire Richard Pearson. You can check it out here.

🚀 PV team project Hyperion Transport Systems was awarded a $50k grant from the Deshpande Center, highlighting the excellent synergy between Proto Ventures and other parts of the MIT innovation ecosystem. Congratulations to Theo, Sam, and Dennis.

🔋 PV team project Vertical Horizons started the delta v startup accelerator at the MIT Trust Center for Entrepreneurship. Congratulations to PV Fellows Cynthia and Hee Yau.

🔥 We kicked off a new PV project to explore the potential of thermal storage for residential heating. We filed an invention disclosure for a proposed system to the MIT Technology Licensing Office, and undergraduate researcher Tsolmon Bazarragchaa started a summer project to determine the techno-economic merit of this proposed technology.

⚡️ I continued my extensive customer discovery in the electric grid sector, with a focus on utility planners and renewable energy developers.

👀 We’ve continued publishing our research notes on our internal website (password: mit venture studio).

🔥 Thermal Storage for Residential Heating

The electrification of everything is a key part of the plan to slash carbon emissions, but it also creating new headaches for the electric grid, especially as many households transition to electric heat pumps. Massachusetts utilities National Grid and Eversource are growing increasingly concerned about their ability to meet electricity needs during the coldest winter days, especially because heating demand coincides largely with peak electricity demand.

What if we could decouple the timing of heating from the time of energy consumption?

A few months ago, I got together with Mike Short and his postdoc Weiyue Zhou to brainstorm opportunities for molten salts — a specialty of Mike and Weiyue's — to make this idea a reality.

Without yet publicly disclosing the details of the invention, the general idea is a system that uses molten salt thermal storage to allow a building (e.g. a residential home) to save money on water or space heating by consuming electricity when it is most affordable (off peak), even if their actual heating usage coincides with peak electricity prices. 

It also allows buildings to transition from natural gas or oil heating to electric heating without a costly upgrade to their utility service or electrical panel, since the thermal storage system can trickle-charge at a low electrical current over the course of many hours rather than taxing the electrical system all at once like a heat pump would.  

In addition, the system helps electric utilities manage the peak demand for electricity by communicating (directly or via an aggregation partner) with an ensemble of these systems, for example to offer favorable pricing many hours before an expected peak electricity demand event later in the day, or to signal to these systems to stop drawing electricity during a severe peak demand event. 

Tsolmon's initial analysis suggests that this system would unlock major savings relative to resistive heating in nearly all cases, and that it would be competitive with heat pumps in scenarios where the outdoor air is sufficiently cold and where electricity is priced at a high enough surcharge during peak times.

One final thing... can you think of any conferences, events, or podcasts that might be interested in featuring us as a speakers or panelists? We'd love to keep spreading the word about Proto Ventures!

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