Jan is the super entrepreneur going against the current

Over the past 20 years, Jan Grimbrandt has been a driving force behind three successful companies that have brought revolutionary environmental technology to a global market. His latest project?– Boson Energy – has the potential to change the way the whole world looks at energy. And garbage.

Jan was interviewed by John Hennius for the bank ?landsbanken’s magazine ‘?landsbanking’. The article was also included in ?landsbanken's recurring promotion insert ‘Private Banking’ in the Swedish business lifestyle magazine Connoisseur. The original article in Swedish can be found on ?landsbanken's site here (Page 18).

It didn't start with Chalmers

In the late 1980s, Jan enrolled at Chalmers University of Technology, but never graduated. “I'm a generalist and interested in systems. It wasn't my thing to sit and break my head over advanced equations.” To better understand non-technological relations, Jan also started studying psychology, economics and environmental science at the University of Gothenburg.

In 1994, Jan joined AltOptronic, a start-up company, as co-owner and head of business development. The company had pioneered research and technical development in laser technology for fast and accurate measurement of gases in process environments, but the technology needed to be taken to market.

After four years, the product was commercialised and globally recognised in its niche in the environmental, energy, chemical and automotive industries. Siemens still sells laser instruments based on the technology worldwide.

Climate warrior with timing

After four years at Siemens, Jan co-founded the combustion optimisation company, Mobotec Europe, in 2004. The few remaining Swedish coal-fired power plants needed to be phased out and Mobotec Europe helped convert the Helsingborg coal-fired power plant to 100% biomass – one of the first of its kind in the world.

“We were working with climate mitigation already in the 2000s.”

Jan's timing turned out to be perfect. In the early 2000s, the EU was expanding and many new members had coal-fired power plants with high emissions. Through innovative thinking and advanced combustion optimisation, Mobotec Europe reduced emissions from coal-fired power in Poland. In 2008, Mobotec Europe was acquired by the American company, Nalco.

Founded Boson Energy in 2008

Jan Grimbrandt doesn't believe in luck, but in the inspiring people and colleagues who have brought him to where he is today. His friend, researcher and professor, Stefan Lundqvist sparked Jan's interest in environmental technology almost 30 years ago, and was a co-founder of AltOptronic.

Another friend is Wlodzimierz Blasiak, who was a professor of furnace and combustion technology at KTH, when Jan brought him into Mobotec Europe.

Already when they first met in the 1990s, Prof Blasiak began to convince Jan of his vision that the future belongs to distributed energy solutions that are local, small-scale and clean.

12 years later, they co-founded Boson Energy in 2008, based partly on research into high-temperature gasification for hydrogen production, that Professor Blasiak started working on back in the 1980s. “Both are smart, for real,” says Jan with open admiration in his voice.

From waste and biomass to clean energy

Boson Energy's basic idea is simple: extract hydrogen and green carbon dioxide from biomass and garbage, to create local, clean and circular energy and replace fossil carbon dioxide. “It's all carbon and hydrogen,” explains Jan.

“In the eyes of a chemist, at the molecular level, there's not much difference between the content of the food we eat, a bucket of coal, a barrel of oil, the trees in the forest, or a can of garbage. They're all energy carriers, but we need to find efficient and clean ways to extract the energy.”

Today, garbage of all kinds ends up in landfills or is burned. Burning is better than landfilling in many ways, but still emits the greenhouse gas, carbon dioxide. Boson Energy has developed a much more sustainable solution:

Through gasification, the chemical content of waste is vaporized, separated and isolated into (somewhat simplified) three components: carbon compounds, hydrogen and other substances. And it's all captured by Boson Energy's 'no waste left behind' technology. The solution is there, according to Jan.

“We've spent a lot of time and resources building a system with a viable business case that can make an impact across the globe.”

Why Hydrogen of all things? from garbage?

There is no mistaking the enthusiasm when Jan explains: “Hydrogen, which becomes pure water when the energy in it is released, is seen as one of the future solutions to the climate and energy crisis. Today, green hydrogen is mainly extracted by electrolysis of water, but at larger scale, this will require huge amounts of electricity.”

“By extracting hydrogen from waste however, we get a local system where we; (1) eliminate garbage, (2) generate local circular hydrogen, (3) remove toxic emissions that would otherwise end up in the air, (4) get green carbon dioxide for commercial use, and (5), convert the ash into a construction material that replaces the climate offender cement.”

Locally produced hydrogen from waste is profitable and easier to distribute to users. It can power hydrogen cars. It can produce electricity where electricity is needed; e.g. for fast charging of electric cars, buses and trucks without drawing a single kilowatt hour from the grid. The hydrogen and green carbon dioxide can also be used to make methanol for ships or circular plastics. Additional bonuses include quieter traffic, cleaner air and a better quality of life.

The macro perspective when Jan talks is staggering. All the pieces seem to be falling into place. Globally, increased prosperity is driving up the amount of waste. With this technology, society gets a clean energy system that is 'replenished' with waste every day in a circular and sustainable model. And if Jan is to be believed,

“None of this is really technically complicated. But you have to know both electrons and molecules - and think in systems.”

Everyone against Jan

So why can't we launch new technologies, solving so many problems at once, faster? Jan explains in an educational way that there are essentially 3 energy systems in the world. They are separate 'top-down' verticals with huge global infrastructure – and that makes the shift slow:

• Diesel and petrol – From e.g. the Middle East, via a worldwide infrastructure of transport and refineries, to a petrol station near to you.
• Natural gas – A resource largely absent in Europe and is brought here in huge pipelines or ships, in the worst case from Russia.
• Electricity system – Mainly coal, nuclear or hydro, depending on where you are.

“Today, the electric vertical is seen as the saviour of the transition,” Jan notes. “But wind and solar power are still barely making an impact on global energy production, and the existing electricity system will not be enough. It would require a huge investment.”

??“You can't solve new challenges with old solutions”

How does Jan see the future?

The big goal is to revolutionise the world's energy system, the business idea is to offer a standardised solution for hydrogen from waste - with plants operating worldwide.

Since waste and biomass are everywhere, this local 'bottom-up' model will be a vital complement to the old large-scale 'top-down' systems and provide local green jobs. Together with smart local and global partners like Scient Group, Motala Verkstad, Pyrogenesis and Topsoe; Boson Energy is poised to grow fast.

But why has super-entrepreneur Jan chosen a path where he has some of the world's most powerful financial dragons against him? “It's great fun!” he exclaims. And he adds, “We see the enormous societal impact potential and the dragons are starting to realise that they also need us.”

“The market has been sluggish and reluctant to change, but now the pieces of the puzzle are literally tumbling into place.

Climate threats, environmental problems, energy prices, electricity shortages, energy security and, paradoxically, carbon dioxide shortages (!) mean that we are facing massive investment and expansion of charging stations, battery 'gigafactories', green steel plants and other infrastructure. At the same time, we cannot ignore people's ingrained behaviours..."?

Why ?landsbanken?

Jan recently moved his family home from Luxembourg so that the children could go to Swedish school. Looking for a bank, he asked a friend on the board for advice. The friend replied: “The best bank in Sweden is ?landsbanken.”

End of the article.

Read more about Boson Energy at bosonenergy.com, and don't forget to follow Boson Energy here on LinkedIn for more updates on our activities. Below, a bonus interview with Jan Grimbrandt from Davos 2022 (8 minutes), an article, and a recent conference presentation:

Here is also an article about Boson Energy from the leading energy publication Recharge Magazine – from early 2022. It was the most read article on Recharge for a week. Click on the picture or here (link to Linkedin-post with the article and some bonus conclusions).

Here is a also 7-minute introduction to Boson Energy from the World Circular Economy Forum in Helsinki last May.

We talked about local Hydrogen, Hydrogen-powered fast charging, green methanol, and vertical farming – all from otherwise non-recyclable waste. We also touched on the fact that waste is actually the only democratic and fair source of energy on the planet. Exploitable amounts of sun, wind, hydro, coal, oil, gas, etc., are very unevenly distributed across the world, and that creates a lot of tension and need for infrastructure. Waste, we all have, everywhere – and the waste in any given city is enough to go zero-emission with all local commercial traffic (taxis, buses, deliver trucks).