The Berlin-based startup starts in stage 1 into the Climate KIC Accelerator, as part of the Side Call Programme. The team tackles the climate challenge of bad insulation and resulting energy consumption of buildings. In Germany, buildings alone are responsible for 35% of end-energy-consumption and 30% of CO2 emissions. Germans spend over €70 billion on heating their homes every year. This energy and money could be saved by a revolutionary refurbishment technology, developed in the Netherlands.

Proven concept, innovative solution

Ecoworks employs this technology, focusing on houses built between 1949 and 1978 with high energy consumption and with a simple typology equipment. There are 2.9 million unrefurbished units in Germany that fit these criteria - in total a market of 120 billion Euros. Ecoworks provides end-to-end refurbishment solutions to housing associations and house owners. Based on the Dutch Energiesprong concept, ecoworks installs prefabricated facade and roof elements in much shorter project cycles than conventional insulation technologies. The roof will contain sufficient photovoltaic panels and electricity storage to reach the NetZero energy standard. After refurbishment, ecoworks provides heat to the tenants, produced by heat pumps and monitors the energy consumption of in order to generate energy savings. Therefore, ecoworks also acts as an electricity provider using the locally produced electricity.

The ecoworks team

The team of Emanuel Heisenberg, Kristofer Fichtner and Michael Vahrenkam are driven by the vision to create a positive ecological impact. All three have significant start-up experience in areas such as renewable energy generation, energy contracting, energy efficiency and heat solution installation. Emanuel created an energy contracting business from scratch and was on the board of a geothermal energy company. Kristofer is one of the co-founders of Thermondo, a technology driven provider of heat solutions with more than 300 employees. The company has digitized the process of heating change from lead generation through sales and installation to after-sales support. Michael has 17 years of experience as CEO in running ESCO, environmental service and water technology companies. Together with Munich Re and ERGO, ecoworks aims to accelerate the NetZero refurbishment of buildings, saving significant amount of CO2 and costs in the future.