U.S.-based R&D startup Elkhorn Products is a new name in the HVAC&R industry with an ambitious goal: to eliminate the industry’s “massive problems” – namely excessive energy consumption and the use of high-GWP refrigerants – with its natural refrigerant-based technologies.
“We aim to reduce direct and indirect [HVAC&R] emissions by 90%,” Heather Jones, CEO at Elkhorn, told NaturalRefrigerants.com in a recent interview. “We intend to challenge the stagnant status quo [and] take over [the industry] with modern, responsible technology.”
Jones is a software developer by trade but told NaturalRefrigerants.com that her refrigeration roots run deep.
“I grew up with refrigeration,” Jones said. “I brazed my first copper when I was five at an RSES [Refrigeration Service Engineers Society] family picnic and watched my dad’s programmer friend build his patented product he sold to Emerson.”
According to Jones, her company’s patent-pending technology – a water (R718)-based refrigeration cycle – has the potential to replace traditional vapor compression. In doing so, this “brand-new” technology could serve a significant portion of the HVAC&R market, she said.
Beyond developing new technologies, Elkhorn is also committed to facilitating their widespread adoption, she added. The company will operate by licensing its creations to manufacturers to create new product lines and has plans to collaborate with manufacturers and engineers to design new systems.
Elkhorn is also using its technology to develop its own systems and components, with the first of those being its Cirrus and Stratus units. The company will use these products as proof of concept and demand.
Jones spoke more about these products and shared insights into goals and plans of the company – which is currently raising $4 million (€3.64 million) in pre-seed funding – with NaturalRefrigerants.com.
This interview has been edited for length and clarity.
Can you tell us any more about your water-based refrigeration cycle?
Heather Jones: Our patent-pending water-based refrigeration cycle, which we call “hydrovaporization,” is an entirely new approach. It eliminates the vapor compression cycle, which introduces around 25% more heat into a system, thus requiring all systems to be 25% larger and work 25% harder.
By using water as the refrigerant, we capitalize on its high latent heat of vaporization. This cycle mimics the Earth’s natural water cycle – a closed-loop system where water evaporates and condenses to facilitate cooling. This not only reduces energy consumption and system complexity but also eliminates the emissions associated with conventional refrigerants.
Which applications is the Elkhorn Cirrus unit designed for?
HJ: Elkhorn Cirrus is our flagship water-based system for medium-to-high-temperature commercial and industrial space cooling applications. It’s a packaged system that can be easily installed and maintained, offering capacities ranging from several tons to hundreds of tons of cooling. This flexibility allows it to cater to both small-scale commercial setups and large industrial operations, such as factories, warehouses and data centers. It is even portable, making it suitable for rentals and emergency situations.
Cirrus is not a precision air-conditioning product. It is what we call a “mass heat trim” (MHT) solution that cuts a chunk of temperature off the top.
Imagine working in a hot factory, a building not suitable for standard industrial-sized air-conditioning products, and you come in one day expecting it to be 100°F (37.8°C), but it’s 85°F (29.4°C). You don’t really mind if it’s 82°F (27.8°C) or 87°F (30.6°C); you’re just happy it’s not 100°F. This low-risk, underserved market provides a perfect ingress for our technologies because the cooling industry, in general, is highly regulated and has standardized expectations. We can perfect this system and apply our learnings to more precise applications of our revolutionary new technology.
In addition to the MHT variant, the Cirrus range includes an HVAC model that focuses on commercial comfort cooling. Cirrus HVAC is a low-cost high-impact retrofit for high-rise building cooling systems, typically chillers, providing relief in urban heat islands. This unit removes the centrifugal compressor and reuses many parts of the chiller. We also have two more variants under development.
Can you tell us more about your Elkhorn Stratus product?
HJ: Elkhorn Stratus is designed to be an add-on technology for existing and new CO₂ (R744) systems. We call it a “plug-n-play” high stage for CO₂ cascade systems. It is intended to enhance the performance of CO₂ refrigeration and heat pump systems, particularly in high-ambient temperature conditions.
Elkhorn Stratus maintains subcritical operation, improving efficiency and reliability at a fraction of the cost of existing subcooling solutions. By integrating this technology, CO₂ systems can achieve higher operational efficiency and lower energy consumption even in challenging climates. Stratus can be applied to various CO₂-based commercial refrigeration applications, including supermarkets and cold storage facilities.
At what stage of development are these products?
HJ: The Elkhorn Cirrus is in the final phases of development with nine prototypes culminating in an operational system. The next prototypes will explore new evaporator designs to fully exploit efficiency gains with water. It is a difficult technology to master but will offer valuable insights for the Stratus, which requires more precision and will therefore benefit from testing the Cirrus.
We are also in discussions with potential partners for pilot installations and real-world demonstrations, which will help refine our products further before commercial launch.
