Evercloak Wins a Global Recognition Award 2026
On a hot afternoon in a pharmaceutical cleanroom in Ontario, the humidity control system runs continuously, consuming enormous amounts of electricity to chill air to its dew point to extract moisture, then reheat it to the required temperature. This is how every building in the world manages humidity today. Evercloak has engineered a fundamentally different approach to delivering up to a 50% reduction in building cooling energy through the world’s first commercially sized graphene oxide membrane system, validated at the National Renewable Energy Laboratory. This manufacturing position has earned a 2026 Global Recognition Award.
Technical Innovation and Architecture
Evercloak’s graphene oxide composite membrane allows water vapor molecules to pass through while blocking air molecules, achieving selective permeability at the atomic layer that no polymer membrane currently matches at commercial production cost. The membrane integrates into a proprietary VaporDrive™ system that extracts humidity from incoming air without phase change, refrigerants, or condensation, delivering dry air to a conventional vapor compression cooling stage that now operates on already-dry air at dramatically lower energy input. This two-stage architecture, membrane dehumidification followed by conventional cooling, is where the 50% energy reduction is realized: removing moisture before cooling eliminates the energy-intensive condensation step that defines conventional air conditioning’s efficiency ceiling.
The manufacturing platform is a roll-to-roll coating process that produces continuous, large-area graphene oxide nanofilms at minimal energy input and minimal process waste, at a cost structure that batch nanomaterial fabrication cannot match. Evercloak can produce membranes using graphene oxide, graphene, carbon nanotubes, hexagonal boron nitride, and other 2D nanomaterials, giving the platform application optionality well beyond HVAC into water filtration, barrier technologies, and electronic devices. NGen documentation from 2021 confirmed Evercloak as the first company in the world to produce commercially sized graphene oxide membranes using this process, a manufacturing position that has strengthened through subsequent scale-up investment and independent validation.
Market Strategy and Leadership
CEO Evelyn Allen, a Professional Engineer and MaRS Women in Cleantech Challenge finalist, co-founded Evercloak in 2018 with Dr. Michael Pope, Associate Professor of Chemical Engineering at the University of Waterloo, where the core membrane science originated. The team’s third senior leader, COO Matt Heuft, Ph.D., brings technology commercialization experience that bridges the scientific foundation and the manufacturer integration conversations that define Evercloak’s commercial pathway. The founding team structure maps precisely to the skill set required to take a nanomaterials breakthrough from university laboratory to global HVAC deployment.
Evercloak’s capital stack combines a $2 million oversubscribed seed round led by Bioindustrial Innovation Canada with CAD $1.1 million from Natural Resources Canada’s Energy Innovation Program, US $350,000 from NYSERDA’s NextGen HVAC Innovation Challenge, and support from Wells Fargo and NREL’s IN2 programHFC refrigerants used in conventional air conditioning, requiring HVAC manufacturers, to provide multi-jurisdictional government validation alongside private capital. The commercial model targets HVAC manufacturers as integration partners rather than building owners as direct customers, supplying membrane modules that integrate into existing air handling unit architectures and scale through established HVAC distribution networks globally. NACO named Evercloak one of Canada’s Top 20 Moonshot Ventures of 2025, confirming independent investment community recognition of the company’s commercial potential at this stage.
Industry Impact and Future Vision
Building cooling currently accounts for 10% of global electricity consumption, and that figure is projected to triple by 2050 as temperatures rise and cooling demand grows in developing markets. Simultaneously, the Kigali Amendment mandates the global phaseout of the HFC refrigerants that power conventional air conditioning, requiring every HVAC manufacturer to develop refrigerant-free alternatives. Evercloak’s membrane system addresses both pressures in a single additive component: refrigerant-free by design and cutting total cooling energy by up to 50%, making it simultaneously a decarbonization tool and a regulatory compliance pathway for manufacturers facing mandatory phaseout timelines.
NREL validation provides independent performance confirmation that global HVAC manufacturers require before committing to component integration, and active manufacturer partnerships are progressing toward commercial deployment across industrial and commercial building categories and, eventually, residential building categories—Evercloak’s commercial surface areas. The roadmap extends the graphene oxide membrane platform into water filtration and barrier technology applications, expanding the commercial surface area of Evercloak’s manufacturing capability beyond HVAC. Evercloak earns the 2026 Global Recognition Award for building the only graphene oxide composite membrane system that simultaneously eliminates refrigerants, cuts building cooling energy by half, and integrates into existing HVAC infrastructure without requiring system replacement.
Proprietary graphene oxide composite membrane achieves water vapor selective permeability at the atomic layer, allowing H₂O molecules to pass while blocking air molecules, a selectivity level that no commercial polymer membrane currently matches
VaporDrive™ system extracts humidity from incoming air without phase change, condensation, or refrigerant compounds, delivering pre-dried air to a downstream vapor compression cooling stage that operates at up to 50% lower energy input
Roll-to-roll coating process produces continuous, large-area graphene oxide nanofilms from single atomic layers to hundreds of nanometers in thickness at minimal energy input and minimal process waste, enabling commercial-scale unit costs
Platform supports multiple 2D nanomaterials including graphene oxide, graphene, carbon nanotubes, and hexagonal boron nitride, providing manufacturing optionality across water filtration, barrier technology, electronics, and corrosion inhibitor applications beyond HVAC
Active HVAC manufacturer partnerships for global system deployment confirmed as of January 2026, with the OEM integration model scaling through established manufacturer distribution and installation networks rather than direct-to-building-owner channels
NYSERDA NextGen HVAC Innovation Challenge winner, confirming US state-level recognition and funding for North American market entry alongside Canadian federal support
Wells Fargo and NREL IN2 program selection, from a $50 million commercial climate solutions fund, provides access to NREL testing infrastructure and investor credibility at the enterprise procurement level
University of Waterloo spin-out with Dr. Michael Pope remaining as an active academic co-founder, maintaining a connection to the materials science research frontier without full internal R&D facility cost at the current stage
NRCan/MaRS Women in Cleantech Challenge finalist status for CEO Evelyn Allen confirms standing within Canada’s leading cleantech gender diversity and innovation recognition program
Building cooling sector projected to triple electricity consumption by 2050, creating a total addressable market expansion that grows larger as the global temperature and urbanization trends driving it accelerate
Active HVAC manufacturer partnerships for global system deployment confirmed as of January 2026, with the OEM integration model scaling through established manufacturer distribution and installation networks rather than direct-to-building-owner channels
NYSERDA NextGen HVAC Innovation Challenge winner, confirming US state-level recognition and funding for North American market entry alongside Canadian federal support
Wells Fargo and NREL IN2 program selection, from a $50 million commercial climate solutions fund, provides access to NREL testing infrastructure and investor credibility at the enterprise procurement level
University of Waterloo spin-out with Dr. Michael Pope remaining as active academic co-founder, maintaining connection to the materials science research frontier without full internal R&D facility cost at current stage
NRCan/MaRS Women in Cleantech Challenge finalist status for CEO Evelyn Allen confirms standing within Canada’s leading cleantech gender diversity and innovation recognition program
Building cooling sector projected to triple electricity consumption by 2050, creating a total addressable market expansion that grows larger as the global temperature and urbanization trends driving it accelerate
Membrane modules designed for integration into existing air handling unit architectures, allowing HVAC manufacturers to add Evercloak dehumidification capability to current product lines without complete system redesign
Refrigerant-free operation eliminates refrigerant handling, storage, leak detection, and phaseout compliance requirements from building operator maintenance procedures
Applicable across building types including industrial facilities, pharmaceutical cleanrooms, data centers, commercial office buildings, and residential HVAC, with initial deployment focus on industrial dehumidification where humidity control specifications are strictest
VaporDrive™ described as a simple, scalable solution for integration into air handling units, with refrigerant-free and low-maintenance characteristics reducing facility management complexity compared to conventional vapor compression dehumidification
NREL validation data provides building operators and HVAC procurement teams with independent third-party performance confirmation, reducing the technical due diligence burden before committing to Evercloak-integrated HVAC systems
Each HVAC system integrating Evercloak membrane modules reduces building cooling electricity consumption by up to 50%, directly reducing CO₂ emissions from the generation required to power that building’s air conditioning
Refrigerant-free design eliminates HFC and HFO compounds from the dehumidification function, removing a second GHG emission category with global warming potentials 700-3,000 times that of CO₂
Roll-to-roll manufacturing process requires minimal energy input and produces minimal process waste, making the production footprint itself lower-carbon than conventional nanomaterial batch fabrication
Graphene oxide derived from graphite avoids rare-earth material dependencies that constrain scaling of competing clean technologies, keeping the supply chain accessible across geographies
Building cooling sector accounts for 40% of global GHG emissions from large air-cooling systems as projected for 2050; Evercloak’s 50% energy reduction applied at deployment scale addresses one of the largest single-category decarbonization opportunities in the built environment
