Renewable Heat as one solution to Europe's Energy Crisis: KraftBlock's Martin Schichtel

Macro Micro Michael Marco & Startups at the Edge (M4Edge)

Developing Clean Energy Solutions With KraftBlock’s Martin Schichtel

Across the world, a huge amount of energy is wasted in the form of heat. In industries like glass and steel, manufacturing processes require extremely high temperatures, and those processes generate a lot of wasted heat. That heat is usually blown directly into the atmosphere.

But what if there was a way to capture, store, and reuse that heat, effectively transforming it into a climate-neutral energy source?

That’s exactly what Martin Schichtel set out to do. A chemist by training, Martin believes he has the answer in the form of a thermal energy storage system called “Kraftblock.”

In this episode, Martin sat down with hosts Marco Annunziata and Michael Leifman to talk about Kraftblock and what it does, its many different applications, and how it may fundamentally change how we use energy.

Show Highlights

[00:49] Factoids about the energy sector

• [02:06] What is Kraftblock and what does it do?
• [02:40] How Kraftblock differs from other energy storage systems
• [04:10] The profile of an early adopter company that fits the mold for where Kraftblock currently is
• [04:56] Two applications for Kraftblock storage units
• [07:38] How Kraftblock differs from “green hydrogen” systems
• [09:21] What needs to happen for Kraftblock to scale up over the next 10 years
• [11:58] The state of the heat market
• [13:05] Closing statements