Impact Innovation: Tins of Vanadium Oxide to kick out tons of Carbon dioxide

As the 3^rd world is fighting hard on global climate deal, shirking away the responsibilities for the green house gas emission, an innovation under process from an Indian Scientist can eliminate the risk posed for the earth atmosphere. 

Sarbajit Banerjee, an associate professor at the University of Buffalo, a state university of New York and his research team recently pioneered an innovative window coating that blocks heat when hot and allows it to enter when cold. This has become a breakthrough innovation in the fight against global warming

"Through research, we discovered that high temperatures caused the compound's crystalline structure to change from one that is transparent to heat to one that actually reflects it. When formed as thin nano wires, the vanadium oxide could be directly applied as a coating on glass. That's how this smart window - capable of reflecting heat at high temperatures instead of allowing it to pass through the glass - got invented. Conversely, in colder temperatures, the coating remains transparent and allows both light and heat through to warm a building's interior," adds Banerjee, who was named as one of the world's top innovators under the age of 35 by MIT Technology Review in 2012

According to him, around the world, billions of dollars are spent every summer on air conditioning to cool homes, factories and vehicles, while releasing hundreds of millions of tons of harmful carbon dioxide into the Earth's atmosphere.

A 2012 report published by Transparency Market Research valued the global air conditioning market at $98.2 billion, with projected growth reaching $178.4 billion by 2018. With this heat-blocking window coating, our goal is to transform windows to adapt dynamically to the external-environment instead of being static, immutable structures that are gluttonous in their energy consumption," shares Banerjee, who is currently in the process of licensing his heat-blocking window coating to industrial partners in the United States.

Banerjee also has a partnership with Tata Steel in Mumbai to explore how to use the coating to deflect heat from the corrugated steel roofs in India and other parts of the developing world. He predicts that it will cost just 50 cents per square foot once this window coating is commercially available.

This is going to be an impact innovation as it has multiple positives. One, it helps to mitigate global warming risk which can translate into better quality of life for the future generations and the other is, it also can help people to live in conditioned temperature without air conditioning equipments. 

The negative will be for the global air conditioning market which can shrink sharply if this becomes effective, in terms of its purpose and price.

Here comes the criticality of “Reverse Innovation”. The development of such products should happen at third world countries which can help to keep the cost low thus making the innovation more affordable when the product comes to the market.

T Margabandhu

Marggo India