Engineering the future
Electrifying boilers to decarbonise industry Zach Winn, MIT News M ore than 200 years ago, the steam boiler helped spark the Industrial Revolution. Since then, steam has been the lifeblood of industrial activity around the world. Today the production of steam – created by burning gas, oil, or coal to boil water – accounts for a significant percentage of global energy use in manufacturing, powering the creation of paper, chemicals, pharmaceuticals, food, and more.
AtmosZero, co-founded by Addison Stark SM ’10, PhD ’14, developed a modular heat pump to electrify the centuries-old steam boiler.
degree – adding mechanical engineering to his studies. “I was interested in the energy transition and in accelerat- ing solutions to enable that,” Stark says. “The transition isn’t happening in a vacuum. You need to align economics, policy, and technology to drive that change.” Stark stayed at MIT to earn his PhD in mechanical engineer- ing, studying thermochemical biofuels. After MIT, he began working on early-stage energy tech- nologies with the Department of Energy’s Advanced Research Projects Agency – Energy (ARPA-E), with a focus on manufac- turing efficiency, the energy-water nexus, and electrification. “Part of that work involved applying my training at MIT to things that hadn’t really been considered for innovation for 50 years,” Stark says. “I was looking at the heat exchanger. It’s so fundamental. I thought, ‘How might we reimagine it in the context of modern advances in manufacturing technology?’” The problem is as difficult as it is consequential, touching nearly every corner of the global industrial economy. More than 2.2 gigatons of CO 2 emissions [1] are generated each year to turn water into steam – accounting for more than five per- cent of global energy-related emissions. In 2020, Stark co-authored an article in the journal Joule with Gregory Thiel SM ’12, PhD ’15 titled, ‘ To decarbonize in- dustry, we must decarbonize heat’ [2] . The article examined opportunities for industrial heat decarbonisation, and it got Stark excited about the potential impact of a standardised, scalable electric heat pump. Most electric boiler options today bring huge increases in operating costs. Many also make use of factory waste heat, which requires pricey retrofits. Stark never imagined he’d be-
Now, the startup AtmosZero, founded by Addison Stark SM ’10, PhD ’14, Todd Bandhauer, and Ashwin Salvi, is taking a new approach to electrify the centuries-old steam boiler. The company has developed a modular heat pump capable of delivering industrial steam at temperatures up to 150 degrees Celsius to serve as a drop-in replacement for combustion boilers. The company says its first 1-megawatt steam system is far cheaper to operate than commercially available electric solu- tions due to ultra-efficient compressor technology, which uses 50% less electricity than electric resistive boilers. The founders are hoping that’s enough to make decarbonised steam boilers drive the next industrial revolution. “Steam is the most important working fluid ever,” says Stark, who serves as AtmosZero’s CEO. “Today everything is built around the ubiquitous availability of steam. Cost-effectively electrifying that requires innovation that can scale. In other words, it requires a mass-produced product – not one-off projects.” Tapping into steam Stark joined the Technology and Policy Programme when he came to MIT in 2007. He went on to complete a dual master’s
“Steam is the most important working fluid ever,” says AtmosZero co-founder Addison Stark.
30 Electricity + Control APRIL 2026
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