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NW Natural, a 163-year-old gas utility based in Portland, announced today a partnership with Washington-based Modern Electron to create clean hydrogen directly from natural gas and blend it into its existing natural gas distribution network.

From Breakthrough Energy’s Cipher: Modern Electron is pursuing a pair of technologies, including the one we mentioned in the main article that increases the productivity of natural gas in residential heating. The other seeks to make low-carbon hydrogen fuel onsite with commercial customers via a process called methane pyrolysis, which would help clean up natural gas using its existing infrastructure.

“When Modern Electron came to us we were intrigued by the idea of stripping the gas down to pure hydrogen. That’s the cleanest burning substance there is,” said Daryl Williams, Qualco president. “We’re trying to get the carbon out of the air and into the soil where it belongs.”

The Clean Energy Fund of the Washington State Department of Commerce has funded Qualco Energy to deploy a hydrogen generation solution from Modern Electron. The Qualco Energy renewable biogas project in Snohomish County leverages Modern Electron’s cost-efficient and environmentally friendly method for producing clean hydrogen with no CO2 emissions. The clean hydrogen produced by Modern Electron will be utilized for power generation that delivers electricity to a local community of 300 homes.

Decarbonising Heat is a significant challenge on the road to Net-Zero, Climate Resilience and Energy Security. It is also a very complex problem as there are several categories of heat that require different technical solutions… To understand how those groundbreaking applications looks, Tony Pan, CEO and Co-founder of Modern Electron, explains his approach to Ultra Energy-Efficiency in Heat.

A startup in Seattle has developed novel technology to create ‘behind the meter’ turquoise hydrogen for commercial and residential buildings. Modern Electron’s technology, which it says can decarbonise gas heating at the point of use…

“More than half the energy we use is for heat, yet most of our decarbonization efforts have been electricity-centric,” said Tom Chi, Founding Partner at At One Ventures. “We need breakthroughs to decarbonize heat energy and Modern Electron is transforming the landscape of the possible.”

A huge amount of energy use on our planet goes toward creating heat, and not only that, but a large amount of that energy is wasted and byproducts like CO2 blasted into the atmosphere. Modern Electron could change that with a new system that captures the emissions and produces clean hydrogen, right inside a factory or building, and $30 million in Series B funding will power its upcoming push to become a household name.

Bothell-based heat and power startup Modern Electron is planning to boost its headcount this year after raising $30 million in December.

Reducing greenhouse gas emissions is perhaps the single biggest challenge that humanity faces. While alternative sources of energy such as solar, wind and nuclear will play a major role, they don’t offer all the answers. That’s why Seattle-based start-up Modern Electron has set out “to tackle some of the hardest-to-decarbonise challenges in the economy”, says co-founder and CEO Tony Pan. In particular, the firm currently focuses on heat, which accounts for around 50 per cent of final energy demand – according to International Energy Agency estimates – and is vital in everything from key industrial process to keeping homes warm.

This week, Will is joined by Tony Pan, CEO and co-founder of Modern Electron, a sustainable heat and power company. Tony shares how there wasn’t really a Eureka! moment in the early days of his start-up, just the natural evolution of a good idea. He also explains that he sees energy as the most important driver of modern civilisation and energy access as the key predictor of quality of life, two facts that drive his passion for the work he does.