Mitch Ishmael and Levon Atoyan co-founded Active Energy in 2017. Together they discovered the world’s first “icephobic” coating, creating a surface impervious to freezing water. This patent-pending coating improves cooling performance by completely eliminating ice buildup. Active Energy, through the Innovation Crossroads entrepreneurship program at Oak Ridge National Laboratory, has harnessed this invention to build an ultra-efficient, low-cost thermal energy storage system. By making ice at night, when power is cheap, plant managers can cool buildings during the day with the stored ice instead of running expensive chillers, significantly lowering their utility bills. Efficient, low-cost energy storage, like Active Energy’s icephobic thermal energy storage system, is the missing link for a renewable energy powered future.