New Energy Challenge

The New Energy Challenge 2026 is seeking start-ups and scale-ups with technologies, platforms and business models that can accelerate the growth of biochar carbon removal by expanding market opportunities, strengthening confidence in carbon removal outcomes, improving operational performance, and enabling broader adoption across sectors.

What we are looking for

• Technologies, product designs, and manufacturing approaches that enable high-volume and/or high-value biochar applications beyond conventional soil amendment, including cement, concrete, asphalt, construction products, infrastructure materials and advanced materials. Solutions should demonstrate product performance, carbon permanence and management of reversal risks, while aligning with relevant standards and specifications, supporting buyer confidence, and providing scalable pathways to market adoption.
• End-to-end traceability, data capture and reporting solutions that reduce the time and cost of verification while strengthening auditability and operational transparency. Areas of interest include chain-of-custody systems, integrated LCA and decision-support tools, automated reporting, registry integration, support for multiple certification schemes, and validation against laboratory or field benchmarks. Solutions should be linked, where possible, to an identifiable project or technology developer, and demonstrate the potential for measurable impact within the next few years.
• On-site tools that rapidly assess biochar properties, batch consistency, contamination risk, carbon content, stability indicators, and suitability for specific end uses. Solutions should reduce reliance on time-consuming laboratory workflows while maintaining credible assurance for registries, buyers and end users.
• Technologies that enable the efficient conversion of variable, mixed, underutilized, residual, waste-derived, or low-cost biomass feedstocks into consistent, high-quality biochar. Areas of interest include feedstock preprocessing, contaminant management, and logistics optimization. Solutions should reduce environmental impacts and lifecycle emissions while maximizing net carbon removal.
• Solutions that improve project economics and resource efficiency through the valorisation of heat, power, bio-oil, syngas or other co-products generated during biochar production. Relevant approaches may include technologies, software, and integration platforms that connect biochar production with industrial sites, biogas facilities, district heating networks, agricultural operations, biorefineries or circular biomass value chains.
• Technologies, software, automation tools, and operational solutions that enhance the performance, reliability, safety, and scalability of existing pyrolysis operations. Solutions may address uptime, emissions performance, safe handling, storage stability, fire and dust risk management, worker exposure controls and repeatable plant operation across distributed or partner-operated assets.
• Trading and market solutions that improve price discovery, liquidity and transaction execution for biochar carbon removal.

Out of scope

• Biochar applications where the primary value proposition is coal replacement, fuel substitution, energy generation, or emissions avoidance rather than durable carbon dioxide removal.

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Certain lower-carbon liquid fuels can contribute to reducing lifecycle emissions in transport sectors that are difficult to electrify and, depending on the fuel and infrastructure, may be compatible with parts of the existing fuel system.

Some lower-carbon liquid fuels may, subject to applicable specifications and blend limits, be used in existing infrastructure or equipment with limited modifications.

Value chain: improve robustness, affordability and access to supply chain.

Technology solutions

• C5 hydrocarbons to fuels
• lignin to SAF
• Carbon dioxide (CO2) to ethanol
• methanol/CO2 separation
• enzymes and biocatalyst

Technologies

• Proof of concept complete at minimum Technology Readiness Level 4-5 and capability to scale to a tangible production of low carbon fuels.
• Pre-treatment requirements in place and considered in the technology total unit cost.
• Preferably an end-to-end integrated technology.

Feedstock

• No negative impact to food crops.
• Feed co-products or feed waste can be an opportunity.
• Biomass from lignocellulosic.
• Valuable by-products production such as sugar, lignin.
• Preferred feedstocks: hardwoods, softwoods, and agricultural residues.

We are also interested in novel concepts for wastewater and condensation: demonstrated management of wastewater, water intensity along with condensation.

Out of scope

• Food waste to ethanol
• Renewable Natural Gas
• Carbon electrolysis and Power to Liquids
• 1G/HEFA
• CO2 conversion technologies

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Industrial water systems in energy-intensive sites face critical challenges due to rising water demand, variable quality, stricter discharge rules, and environmental pressures. Innovative, scalable water technologies are needed to enhance water security, reduce costs, enable reuse, and comply with evolving regulations.

Seawater desalination

Industrial facilities in arid coastal regions struggle with high salinity, temperature, biofouling, and boron in seawater, increasing energy and fouling costs. Current desalination is costly and space-limited, requiring solutions like advanced reverse osmosis (RO), hybrid membranes, and brine management to lower costs while meeting quality standards. We are looking for low-cost seawater desalination solutions.

Recycling treated effluents

Refineries and municipal plants underutilize treated wastewater due to quality variability, limiting reuse and increasing freshwater demand. We are looking for technologies for polishing effluents, filtration, anti-scalant optimization, and monitoring aim to expand reuse in cooling, boilers, and irrigation.

Sludge reuse technologies

Disposal of oily and biological sludges is costly and environmentally risky. We are looking for resource recovery methods such as oil extraction, co-processing in cement kilns, pyrolysis, and biochar production offer circular economy benefits while ensuring compliance with environmental standards.

PFAS destruction innovations

Legacy Per- and Polyfluoroalkyl Substances (PFAS) contamination from firefighting foams and industrial waste poses regulatory and liability challenges. Most commonly used PFAS treatment methods primarily separate or concentrate PFAS rather than destroy them. We are looking for advanced methods like electrochemical oxidation, plasma, UV-sulphite, and supercritical oxidation for effective onsite or regional destruction.

Resource recovery from waste streams or byproducts

The main challenge for recovering valuable material from effluents and byproducts is the complexity and variability of these streams. The NEC is also interested in new ideas/technologies/set-ups to deal with this complexity.

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The shipping and maritime sector is under increasing pressure to reduce emissions, improve safety and prepare for a more divers fuel mix, while continuing to operate in a highly cost-sensitive and operationally complex environment. The sector requires practical, scalable and measurable technologies that can positively improve in the near-term impact on vessel performance, emissions and safety, while also enabling a staged transition toward marine operations that are less carbon intensive and compatible with emerging alternative fuel technologies.

The NEC 2026 is looking for start-ups and scale-ups that can help accelerate deployable solutions across methane abatement, emissions measurement, safety, digitalisation, energy efficiency, retrofit pathways and future-fuels readiness.

• Methane abatement and emissions measurement: Solutions that can accurately measure, monitor, verify and reduce methane slip from marine engines and onboard systems. Priority areas include robust continuous emissions monitoring, low-maintenance sensors, engine combustion improvements, after-treatment technologies, additives or accelerants, and data solutions that support credible emissions management and compliance.
• Marine safety and inspection: Technologies that remove people from harm’s way by reducing the need for manual inspection, hazardous access, confined-space entry or high-risk onboard interventions. Relevant solutions may include robotics, drones, remote inspection tools, autonomous monitoring systems and safety technologies that improve situational awareness and operational decision-making.
• Targeted AI and autonomy: Use-case-driven AI, digital and autonomous technologies that address specific marine safety, inspection, maintenance, vessel performance or operations-support challenges. The focus is not broad “AI for shipping”, but practical tools that improve reliability, reduce human exposure, enhance data capture and enable better decisions under real operating conditions.
• Near-term energy efficiency and retrofit solutions: Retrofit-friendly technologies that reduce fuel consumption, improve vessel performance and can be demonstrated on existing assets without major disruption. This includes hydrodynamic improvements, hull and propulsion optimisation, onboard energy management, operational efficiency tools and other energy efficient technologies with clear performance evidence and scalability potential.
• Future fuels readiness and vessel upgradeability: Solutions that help de-risk the transition to future marine fuels by improving fuel flexibility, onboard integration, storage, handling, safety and upgradeability. This includes technologies that enable vessels to remain adaptable as fuel pathways, infrastructure, regulation and customer demand continue to evolve.
• Incremental decarbonisation pathways: Practical technologies that support stepwise emissions reduction rather than relying only on fully mature end-state solutions. Relevant areas include drop-in or lower-carbon fuels, LNG and bio-LNG improvement pathways, onboard carbon capture, fuel-cell demonstrations, fuel-flexible designs and other solutions that can be validated in realistic marine operating environments.

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AI and cloud computing are driving unprecedented demand for datacentre capacity. At the same time, transmission and distribution networks are increasingly constrained, resulting in long connection queues, infrastructure bottlenecks and growing challenges in maintaining system reliability.

Grid operators are exploring whether flexible datacentre loads could help unlock faster connections and more efficient utilisation of existing network capacity. While technologies such as workload orchestration, advanced cooling, battery storage and on-site generation may provide flexibility, datacentres must continue to meet stringent availability, resilience and service-level requirements.

For NEC 2026, we are looking for start-ups and scale-ups that can help datacentres demonstrate, validate and monetise flexibility in a manner that is credible to grid operators, commercially attractive to datacentre owners and supportive of wider power system needs.

Reliability and energy efficiency

Solutions that improve datacentre energy performance while maintaining operational resilience. Priority areas include:

• AI-driven workload orchestration
• Intelligent cooling optimisation
• Real-time energy management systems
• Data-centre energy forecasting
• Automated flexibility verification
• Performance and SLA assurance technologies

Particular interest will be given to solutions capable of quantifying available flexibility while demonstrating no material impact on reliability or customer service levels.

Grid access and connection acceleration

Solutions that help datacentres secure electricity connections more rapidly by demonstrating operational flexibility to transmission and distribution network operators. Priority areas include:

• Flexible interconnection solutions
• Dynamic import and export controls
• Non-firm connection technologies
• Grid-aware energy management systems
• Flexible capacity management
• Grid-constrained site optimisation

A key challenge is enabling datacentres to provide sufficient confidence to grid authorities that demand can be managed during constrained network conditions.

Flexible energy assets

Solutions that leverage on-site energy infrastructure as a source of flexibility. Priority areas include:

• Battery energy storage systems
• UPS optimisation
• Backup generation optimisation
• Thermal storage
• Hybrid energy systems
• Automated dispatch and controls

Particular interest will be given to solutions that deliver flexibility without requiring interruption of critical computing loads.

Flexibility trading and commercialisation

Solutions that enable datacentres to participate commercially in power markets once flexibility has been demonstrated. Priority areas include:

• Demand-response platforms
• Ancillary-services participation
• Flexibility marketplaces
• Virtual power plant integration
• Congestion-management services
• Energy optimisation and trading platforms

The objective is to transform datacentre flexibility from an operational capability into a measurable and tradable product that creates value for datacentre operators, grid operators and energy providers.

What we are looking for

We are particularly interested in start-ups and scale-ups that can demonstrate:

• Measurable and verifiable flexibility
• Improved access to grid capacity
• Enhanced operational resilience
• Applicability across multiple European markets
• Scalable commercial deployment models
• Pathways towards participation in electricity markets and flexibility services

Apply here!