QLM is honoured to be named a 2021 BloombergNEF Pioneer, joining eleven other companies recognised for their leadership in transformative technologies.

Chosen from over 250 applications from 36 different countries, QLM is the only UK-based company featured among the Pioneers, who offer innovations in one of three major climate challenges:

• Managing and optimising long-haul freight
• Advancing materials and techniques for sustainable products
• Monitoring and understanding our changing planet

QLM’s revolutionary quantum gas camera is well-positioned to address the third challenge, with its unique ability to detect, visualise and quantify emissions of methane and other key greenhouse gases.  The quantum gas camera can help organisations achieve net zero through mitigation of emission sources.

The publicity that is generated directly by the award and association with BloombergNEF, and QLM’s inclusion in the award cohort, serves as a strong indication of two key messages:

First, it acknowledges that continuous, autonomous monitoring of emissions is industrially relevant now and in the future.  Current emissions detection methods, involving walk-over studies using optical gas imaging (OGI) cameras, and handheld “sniffers”, are expensive, slow and labour-intensive; more importantly, they are also intermittent. If a leak develops in a piece of equipment the day after the survey is completed, it continues until the following survey, which can incur months of additional emissions. Intermittent surveys by mobile, airborne or satellite technologies have the same limitation. Continuous monitoring has been seen as the theoretical answer to this for some time, but no technique thus far has offered the combination of simultaneous detection, localisation, quantification and reporting on a continuous basis that industry requires.  The award recognises that this solution is now a reality.

Second, the award acknowledges that QLM is ideally positioned to meet the industrial demands of continuous monitoring.  Any widely-adopted continuous solution has to be affordable, industrially scalable and environmentally robust.  QLM’s compact and easily-deployable quantum gas camera has achieved this in a form factor that is suitable for scale-up of production when the demand arises.

QLM is set to change the way emissions of methane and key greenhouse gases are monitored and quantified at the facility scale, enabling organisations to achieve net zero through effective mitigation. The endorsement of BloombergNEF shows that the energy industry is beginning to recognize the necessity of continuous monitoring, and that QLM is ideally posed to solve this problem.

Read more about the BNEF Pioneers program on their blog.