News #energy
Read time: 02'57''
4 January 2024
Mark & Christophe

Sunny Salvation: E.ON partners with UK renewable heat innovator Naked Energy

E.ON chooses innovative British technology as renewable heat solution for large-scale industry and city decarbonisation projects across Europe and UK.

The sun, this incredible ball of gas and light providing life on Earth, and now improving it.

This great star shining in the sky has always been a source of fascination, but also heat and energy, for humans all around the world.

Some civilisations, such as the Celts and the Mayas, used to built monuments of worship and study dedicated to the sun.

Others, such as the ancient Greeks, Egyptians, Romans, Native Americans and Chinese, used it as a source of heat for their homes.

In 2024, it seems as humanity has finally harnessed its power. For too long, we have used fossil energies to fuel our homes. By digging the Earth to find these fuels, we were also digging our own graves.

We are now entering a new era, an era in which the power of our greatest star will supply humanity with energy better than ever before.

To take a glimpse into the futre, put your sunglasses on, and look up.

Partners aiming to the sun

E.ON partners with the British company Naked Energyas a part of a groupwide Innovation program. Naked Energy’s solar heat and hybrid technology supports customers with high energy demand and limited available space providing high energy density solar technology.

The E.ON Group is one of Europe’s largest operators of energy networks and energy infrastructure and a provider of innovative solutions for its city, industry and consumer customers. E.ON runs multiple worldwide Innovation programs like “Free Electrons” to find, test and scale new technology solutions like Naked Energy to drive forward the energy transition in Europe.

The deal will see Naked Energy’s market-leading solar technology deployed to commercial and industrial-scale projects across Europe and the United Kingdom run by E.ON´s business unit Energy Infrastructure Solutions (EIS). Once the pilot is completed, it will allow EIS to offer Naked Energy’s solar technology to a range of customers who will benefit from reduced fossil fuel usage and improved financial returns.

“This deal marks an exciting step forward in Naked Energy’s journey as we scale our operations globally. We look forward to beginning our work together.” says Christophe Williams, CEO and co-founder of Naked Energy.

Changing the the worldwide ecosystem

EIS provides integrated, sustainable, and digitally enabled energy solutions for cities and industries to reduce their carbon emissions. In 16 European countries, EIS services 1.5 million customers through 4,500 plants, which collectively produce 19 terawatt hours of heating, cooling, and steam and 12 terawatt hours of electricity. 

Naked Energy is the British developer of the world’s highest energy density solar technology for flat roofs. Their solar heat collectors save up to four times the amount of carbon as standard solar PV panels and are perfectly positioned for the decarbonisation of heat in the global commercial and industrial space.

“E.ON is committed to climate protection and the sustainable energy transition. Highly innovative technology partners like Naked Energy play a pivotal role in expediting the transition to sustainable energy. We are excited about this partnership.” says Mark Ritzmann, Managing Director at E.ON Group Innovation.

“Only through technological advancement our societies will come anywhere close to reaching the climate targets. Making technological innovation available to our business units so they can scale, is our role at E.ON Innovation.”  says Stefan Padberg who leads E.ON´s Startup program in the US as Managing Director E.ON Innovation Co- Investments.

Cutting-edge technology for a healthy and powerful planet

Naked Energy’s range of solar heat collectors are called Virtu. VirtuHOT is TÜV-certified and converts the sun’s energy into heat up to 120°C while its revolutionary solar PVT collector, VirtuPVT, simultaneously generates both PV electricity and solar heat up to 75°C. The business has also developed a complementary platform, Clarity247, to monitor the performance of Virtu as well as integrated technologies like PV panels in real time – something rarely seen in the industry. 

Naked Energy’s technology will be offered to a range of EIS customers across Europe who have a strong use case for renewable heat, such as breweries, food and beverage, apartment blocks, hotels, leisure centres with swimming pools, and district heat networks.

The deal builds momentum for Naked Energy as they now scale their technology for a global market and complete their Series B funding round, targeting £30M.