Nature's Blueprint: How Zero-Energy Tech is Cooling a Warming World

SHENZHEN, China – March 06, 2026 – An academic promotion at the City University of Hong Kong (CityUHK) is signaling a major milestone in the global fight against climate change. Professor Edwin Tso Chi-Yan, a leading researcher and co-founder of climate-tech firm i2Cool Limited, is set to become the Chair Professor of Energy and Sustainability this July. While a significant personal achievement, the promotion underscores a much larger story: the successful journey of a revolutionary, electricity-free cooling technology from a university lab to a globally deployed solution for a rapidly warming planet.

Inspired by the humble Saharan silver ant, Professor Tso’s research has yielded a suite of products that can cool surfaces below the ambient air temperature without using a single watt of electricity. This technology, known as passive radiative cooling (PRC), is now being applied to rooftops, building facades, and even solar panels in over 30 countries, measurably reducing energy consumption and carbon emissions.

The Coolest Science: From Desert Ant to Global Solution

The genesis of this innovation lies not in a high-tech lab, but in the harsh expanse of the Sahara Desert. Professor Tso's research team studied the Saharan silver ant, an insect capable of surviving extreme surface temperatures that would be fatal to most other creatures. The key is its unique coat of hairs, which possess a dual-function structure: they are exceptionally effective at reflecting sunlight while simultaneously radiating the ant's own body heat away into the cold of deep space.

This biological masterclass in thermal management became the blueprint for i2Cool's technology. By integrating materials science, optics, and thermodynamics, the team engineered multi-component, multi-scale nanoparticle materials that mimic the ant's abilities on a massive scale. The resulting coatings and films achieve up to 95% solar reflectivity, bouncing the sun's energy away before it can be absorbed as heat. Simultaneously, they exhibit high emissivity in the mid-infrared spectrum, allowing them to efficiently radiate stored heat through the Earth's “atmospheric window” and into outer space.

The result is a powerful sub-ambient cooling effect. Unlike traditional insulation, which only slows the transfer of heat, PRC technology actively sheds heat, making surfaces cooler than the surrounding air even under direct sunlight. This breakthrough, detailed in over 100 papers in prestigious journals like Science and Nature Sustainability, represents a paradigm shift from energy-intensive cooling to a genuinely zero-energy, zero-refrigerant solution.

From Lab to Market: The Rise of i2Cool

Translating a brilliant scientific discovery into a viable commercial product is a journey fraught with challenges. For Professor Tso, this path was accelerated by CityUHK's HK Tech 300 innovation and entrepreneurship program. In 2021, armed with a proven concept and support from the university, Professor Tso co-founded i2Cool Limited with Dr. Martin Zhu.

The company’s first product, a paint-like coating named i2Coating, was launched in September 2022 and quickly demonstrated its superiority over conventional thermal insulation coatings, which typically struggle to surpass 90% solar reflectance. The success of this initial offering paved the way for a broader product line, including i2Membrane for rooftops and i2Film for glass facades, addressing multiple sources of heat gain in buildings.

Professor Tso’s leadership in this venture is backed by a formidable academic record. Consistently ranked among Stanford University's "World's Top 2% Scientists" since 2020, his work has been recognized with numerous accolades, including election to the Hong Kong Young Academy of Sciences and the prestigious National Science Fund for Excellent Young Scholars. This dual identity as a top-tier academic and a successful entrepreneur highlights a growing trend where university research provides direct solutions to pressing global problems, with incubators like HK Tech 300 acting as a critical catalyst.

Measurable Impact: Cooling Cities and Slashing Emissions

The technology’s real-world performance has been nothing short of transformative. To date, i2Cool’s solutions have been applied across more than 800,000 square meters in over 500 projects worldwide, from the extreme heat of Dubai to the dense urban landscape of Hong Kong. The cumulative impact is staggering: an estimated saving of nearly 16 million kWh of electricity and a reduction of over 15 million kilograms of carbon emissions.

High-profile projects validate these figures. At the Hong Kong Coliseum, a 9,700-square-meter application is projected to cut electricity use by 300,000 kWh annually. In Guangzhou, a college rooftop coated with the material saw surface temperatures plummet by nearly 43°C, leading to an estimated annual carbon reduction of over 2,300 tonnes. Even in rural Hunan, a pilot project at a school with frequent power outages reduced indoor temperatures by over 8°C, dramatically improving the learning environment without relying on the grid.

This success has positioned i2Cool as a key player in the rapidly expanding market for passive cooling materials, a sector projected to grow into a multi-billion-dollar industry by 2032. Driven by stringent environmental regulations and the urgent need to mitigate the urban heat island effect—where cities become dangerously hotter than surrounding areas—demand for such technologies is soaring. i2Cool's ability to deliver surface temperature reductions of over 40°C in some cases gives it a significant edge in this competitive landscape.

The Future is Electricity-Free

With his promotion to Chair Professor, Tso is poised to lead the next wave of innovation in this field. Supported by Hong Kong's Research, Academic and Industry Sectors One-plus (RAISe+) scheme, his team and i2Cool are already developing the next generation of materials that promise to create a complete electricity-free cooling ecosystem.

These future innovations include Passive Radiative Cooling Ceramics (PRCCs) for durable building exteriors, Passive Radiative Cooling Pavement (PRCP) materials to cool roads and public spaces, and even Biodegradable Dual-Mode Thermal Management Textiles (Bio-DTMTs) for personal cooling. This strategic expansion moves beyond cooling individual buildings to tackling urban heat at its source—on our streets, in our infrastructure, and even in the clothes we wear.

The vision is clear: to establish a world where cooling is not a luxury dependent on a strained electrical grid, but an inherent property of the materials that build our cities. As global temperatures continue to rise, this nature-inspired technology offers a scalable, sustainable, and powerful tool to build a more resilient and energy-efficient future.