ClearSign Technologies Corporation Debuts New ClearSign Core™ M Series Process Burner Technology at Global Chemical Company in Texas

Rhea-AI Summary

ClearSign Technologies (Nasdaq: CLIR) has successfully installed and demonstrated its new ClearSign Core™ M1 burner technology at a global chemical company's Texas Gulf coast facility. The innovative technology has achieved remarkable performance metrics:

The burner demonstrated sub 2ppm NOx emissions with under 15% excess air, resulting in approximately 3% efficiency improvement compared to other sub 10ppm NOx burners in the market. This breakthrough originated from reimagining fuel, air, and flue gases flow paths within the burner through computational fluid dynamics modeling.

The technology was installed in a horizontally fired process heater built by Tulsa Heaters Midstream and will remain in commercial operation. While initially designed for the horizontal fired market, the company believes this advanced technology is suitable for other applications, including boilers.

Positive

• Achieved sub 2ppm NOx emissions, outperforming existing technologies
• 3% efficiency improvement compared to other sub 10ppm NOx burners
• Successful first commercial installation and operation
• Technology applicable to multiple markets including boilers

Negative

• None.

Insights

Financial Analyst

ClearSign's debut of their new ClearSign Core™ M1 burner technology represents a significant product advancement with clear commercial potential. The technology demonstrates two important competitive advantages: achieving sub 2ppm NOx emissions while operating with under 15% excess air, resulting in approximately 3% efficiency improvement compared to competing low-NOx burners.

This performance combination addresses a critical market pain point: historically, ultra-low emissions often came at the cost of efficiency penalties. For industrial operators, a 3% efficiency gain translates to substantial operational cost savings over equipment lifetime, potentially creating compelling ROI for customers while helping them meet increasingly stringent emissions regulations without expensive SCR systems.

The installation at a global chemical company provides important market validation beyond laboratory testing. The partnership with Tulsa Heaters Midstream, who incorporated ClearSign's technology into their equipment, establishes a commercial channel that could accelerate market penetration.

Most promising is management's indication of "notable engagement" in the horizontally fired heater segment and potential applications in other markets including boilers. This suggests the technology could address multiple industrial market segments, expanding ClearSign's addressable market.

For a $39.4 million market cap company, successfully commercializing proprietary technology with demonstrated advantages in the massive industrial combustion market could significantly impact future revenue growth and profitability if the company can effectively scale manufacturing and sales.

Engineering Specialist

The technical achievements in ClearSign's new M1 burner represent an engineering breakthrough in combustion science. Achieving sub 2ppm NOx emissions with under 15% excess air is remarkably difficult from a thermodynamics perspective. Most ultra-low NOx burners require significantly higher excess air levels (20-30%), creating efficiency penalties through heat losses in exhaust gases.

What makes this development particularly noteworthy is that it resulted from computational fluid dynamics modeling rather than traditional iterative physical prototyping. This indicates sophisticated R&D capabilities and suggests potential for further innovations through similar digital-first approaches. The company effectively redesigned conventional flow paths of fuel, air and flue gases within the burner to achieve these results.

The fact that the first field installation performed as predicted by simulation data is testament to the robustness of their engineering approach. This "first article" success rate is uncommon in thermal equipment development, where field adjustments are typically needed.

From an applications standpoint, horizontal fired process heaters represent a substantial market segment in petrochemical operations, but the potential extension to boiler applications significantly expands market opportunity. Boilers are ubiquitous across manufacturing, institutions, and commercial buildings.

With increasing global pressure to reduce NOx emissions while improving energy efficiency, technology that simultaneously addresses both objectives positions ClearSign favorably against competitors who typically optimize for either emissions or efficiency, but struggle to deliver both simultaneously.

Technology Demonstrates Superior NOx and Efficiency Performance

TULSA, Okla., March 5, 2025 /PRNewswire/ -- ClearSign Technologies Corporation (Nasdaq: CLIR) ("ClearSign" or the "Company"), an emerging leader in industrial combustion and sensing technologies that support decarbonization, improve operational and energy efficiency, enable the use of hydrogen as a fuel and enhance safety while dramatically reducing emissions, announces that following the installation of a new burner technology into the Texas Gulf coast facility of a global chemical company, the Company is reporting selective catalytic reduction ("SCR") level nitrogen oxide ("NOx") emissions in addition to high heat transfer efficiency within the heater. The new burner technology, the first of this new "M" series, will be marketed as ClearSign Core™ M1.

"Over the past two weeks we have started up and run the first installation of a distinctly new burner technology branded as ClearSign Core™ M1. This new technology originated from reimagining the flow paths of fuel, air and flue gases within a burner and is the product of our internal computational fluid dynamics modelling led by our Chief Technology Officer, Matthew Martin," said Jim Deller, Ph.D., Chief Executive Officer of ClearSign.  "The newly installed burner has demonstrated combined NOx and efficiency capabilities that outperform all burner technology that we are aware of, including our own. For instance, our own measurements indicated that this burner technology achieved sub 2ppm NOx with under 15% excess air suggesting an efficiency improvement of approximately 3% compared to other sub 10ppm NOx burners available on the market today. We believe it is a remarkable accomplishment to achieve these results in a first article burner taken directly from computational modelling and into field operations. We would like to thank both of our Gulf Coast customer and heater manufacturer Tulsa Heaters Midstream, for their support and for enabling the demonstration of this project."

"We pride ourselves in providing state of the art heaters to our customers. We were pleased to work with ClearSign, and to be part of bringing this new burner technology to market and showing the combined performance of these burners in our heater," said Justin Forth, President of Tulsa Heaters Midstream. "We believe that technology like this allows up to push the boundaries of clean technology, and enables us to deliver better products to our customers."

"We have seen notable engagement in this horizontally fired process heater segment and this new technology was configured specifically for that market. We have been able to share and discuss these results with interested parties and have had a positive response. While initially designed for the horizontal fired market, we believe that this advanced technology is well suited for other applications, including boilers," concluded Dr. Deller. 

The new burner, branded as the ClearSign Core™ M1, was installed on a demonstration basis into a horizontally fired process heater built by Tulsa Heaters Midstream and will remain in commercial operation following this successful startup and performance results. Tulsa Heaters Midstream is a fast growing and innovative heater provider based in Tulsa, Oklahoma and engaged with ClearSign to facilitate the demonstration of this new burner technology.

About ClearSign Technologies Corporation

ClearSign Technologies Corporation designs and develops products and technologies for the purpose of decarbonization and improving key performance characteristics of industrial and commercial systems, including operational performance, energy efficiency, emission reduction, safety, the use of hydrogen as a fuel and overall cost-effectiveness. Our patented technologies, embedded in established OEM products as ClearSign Core™ and ClearSign Eye™ and other sensing configurations, enhance the performance of combustion systems and fuel safety systems in a broad range of markets, including the energy (upstream oil production and down-stream refining), commercial/industrial boiler, chemical, petrochemical, transport and power industries. For more information, please visit www.clearsign.com.

Cautionary note on forward-looking statements

All statements in this press release that are not based on historical fact are "forward-looking statements." You can find many (but not all) of these statements by looking for words such as "approximates," "believes," "hopes," "expects," "anticipates," "estimates," "projects," "intends," "plans," "would," "should," "could," "may," "will" or other similar expressions. While management has based any forward-looking statements included in this press release on its current expectations on the Company's strategy, plans, intentions, performance, or future occurrences or results, the information on which such expectations were based may change. These forward-looking statements rely on a number of assumptions concerning future events and are subject to a number of risks, uncertainties and other factors, many of which are outside of the Company's control, which could cause actual results to materially differ from such statements. Such risks, uncertainties and other factors include, but are not limited to: the performance of the Company's burners, including related fuel and electricity savings and its ability to lower NOx emissions; the Company's ability to accelerate development timelines of new burner technologies while minimizing overall costs through the use of its computer modeling techniques; the performance of the ClearSign Core™ M1 and its ability to outperform other burner technologies currently available in the market; the Company's ability to leverage the positive results of its installed ClearSign Core™ M1 into additional sales in the horizontally fired process heater and boiler segments; any changes to the regulatory landscape for decarbonization efforts, including related to federal funding and grants, across industries; the performance of the Company's computer modeling technique and its ability to reduce greenhouse gas emissions and design new technologies; the Company's ability to successfully deliver, install, and meet the performance obligations of the Company's products, including  process burners, boiler burners and flare products, in the markets the Company operate and sell its products in; the Company's ability to successfully manufacture and supply its  burner products timely; the Company's ability to further expand into other geographic markets; the performance of the Company's flex fuel hydrogen capable burner; the Company's ability to further expand the sale of ultra-low NOx process and boiler burners, including the flex fuel hydrogen capable burner; the Company's ability to successfully perform engineering orders and performance optimization processes included therein; general business and economic conditions; the performance of management and the Company's employees; the Company's ability to obtain financing, when needed; the Company's ability to compete with competitors; whether the Company's technology will be accepted and adopted and other factors identified in the Company's Annual Report on Form 10-K filed with the U.S. Securities and Exchange Commission and available at www.sec.gov and other factors that are detailed in the Company's periodic and current reports available for review at www.sec.gov. Furthermore, the Company operates in a competitive environment where new and unanticipated risks may arise. Accordingly, investors should not place any reliance on forward-looking statements as a prediction of actual results. The Company disclaims any intention to, and, except as may be required by law, undertakes no obligation to, update or revise forward-looking statements to reflect events or circumstances that subsequently occur or of which the Company hereafter become aware.

View original content to download multimedia:https://www.prnewswire.com/news-releases/clearsign-technologies-corporation-debuts-new-clearsign-core-m-series-process-burner-technology-at-global-chemical-company-in-texas-302392784.html

SOURCE ClearSign Technologies Corporation

FAQ

What are the key performance metrics of ClearSign's new M1 burner technology (CLIR)?

The ClearSign Core™ M1 achieves sub 2ppm NOx emissions with under 15% excess air, delivering approximately 3% efficiency improvement compared to other sub 10ppm NOx burners.

Where has ClearSign Technologies (CLIR) installed its first M1 burner?

The first ClearSign Core™ M1 burner was installed at a global chemical company's facility on the Texas Gulf coast.

What markets is ClearSign's (CLIR) new M1 burner technology targeting?

While initially designed for the horizontally fired process heater market, the technology is also suitable for other applications including boilers.

How does ClearSign's (CLIR) new M1 burner technology improve efficiency?

The technology achieves approximately 3% better efficiency compared to other low NOx burners through optimized flow paths of fuel, air and flue gases.

What distinguishes ClearSign's (CLIR) M1 burner from existing technologies?

The M1 burner combines industry-leading NOx emissions (sub 2ppm) with superior efficiency, outperforming all known burner technologies in the market.