What is the payback period on a SIMIX application?

Commercial HVAC applications commonly report payback in 3 to 9 months. A certified HVAC technician typically charges an estimated 75 to 125 dollars per ton to clean and coat a unit, which is why the return lands inside a single budget cycle rather than across several.

Is SIMIX an operating expense or a capital project?

It can be built either way. The energy reduction shows up as an operating expense saving on the utility bill, while the corrosion protection defers a scheduled capital replacement. Many facilities approve it as a capital project precisely because the deferral value exceeds the application cost.

How does carbon separation differ from carbon capture and storage?

Carbon capture and storage is capital-intensive infrastructure with ongoing compression, transport and storage costs. SIMIX applies carbon separation at the surface: a one-time application whose photocatalytic reaction breaks down pollutants continuously, with no ongoing operating cost attached to it.

Does deferring an HVAC replacement have a carbon value?

Yes. Every replacement avoided also avoids the embodied carbon of manufacturing and shipping a new unit. That embodied carbon is not visible on a utility bill but does count against a corporate decarbonisation target.

The business case

A maintenance request, rewritten as a capital project

Coil cleaning and coating usually arrives on a CFO's desk as a line item. It reads better as an instrument: it suppresses operating expense on the utility bill, and it defers capital expenditure on equipment that was heading for replacement. Both halves are below.

See the audited numbers →

12–24%

Site-specific reported reduction in air conditioning electricity use

16–26%

Reported gain in system airflow

3–9 mo

Typical reported payback on commercial HVAC

Two levers

OpEx down, CapEx deferred

The same application moves two different numbers. Which one carries the approval depends on whose budget the money is coming from.

Lever 01

OpEx reduction

Energy efficiency you can read off a utility bill.

CONDUCTIVE LIQUID GLASS

Conventional coatings insulate the coil, which is the opposite of what a heat exchanger needs. SIMIX uses silica with potassium and lithium to leave a conductive layer, and the titanium dioxide in it drives the photocatalytic reaction. Heat moves off the surface, airflow improves 16–26%, and run times fall.

THE AVOIDED COAL LEVER

SIMIX's energy briefings put coal at roughly 20% of energy production but around 55% of total CO₂ emissions. Because marginal demand is what gets met by the dirtiest plant on the grid, a 12–24% cut in kWh is not a neutral saving — it is the specific kilowatt-hour a CFO under an ESG mandate most wants to avoid buying.

PAYBACK

A certified HVAC technician typically charges an estimated $75–125 per ton to clean and coat a unit. Against a 12–24% energy reduction, that lands the payback at 3–9 months — inside a single budget cycle, and well short of the horizon on solar or a mechanical replacement.

Lever 02

CapEx deferral

Asset life extension you can defend to a board.

OXIDATION & CORROSION, TERMINATED

The coating reflects UV and infrared radiation and seals the microscopic gaps where oxidation begins, which stops the corrosion process rather than slowing it. Salt air and acid rain damage end, and the major HVAC replacement they were driving moves off the capital schedule — cash that stays in reserves.

CARBON SEPARATION, NOT CAPTURE

Carbon capture and storage is heavy infrastructure with permanent operating cost attached — compression, transport, storage, monitoring. SIMIX's carbon separation works at the surface instead: one low-cost application whose photocatalytic reaction breaks down CO₂ and other greenhouse gases continuously, with effectively no future expense line behind it.

EMBODIED CARBON MITIGATION

A replacement that never happens also avoids the embodied carbon of building and shipping the new unit. That figure never shows up on a utility bill, but it is a real, countable wedge against a corporate decarbonisation mandate — and it accrues the moment the replacement is deferred.

Energy, airflow and payback ranges reflect reported results across documented commercial sites. Grid and emissions figures are cited from SIMIX energy briefing materials. Outcomes are site-specific and vary with climate, equipment age, run hours and utility rate.

Audited proof

Twelve months of metered data

The strongest argument for treating this as a refurbishment tool is that it was measured on equipment nobody would call new.

Documented case study

American Leadership Academy · Gilbert, Arizona

A 59,300 sq ft elementary charter school in the Phoenix East Valley: 44 Trane rooftop units, nine years old, 215.5 tons of capacity. Russell McArthur, the district's Director of Fleet Readiness, cleaned and coated every unit in place — nothing was replaced. Twelve months of 2025 usage was then measured against the 2024 baseline, month by month.

21.52%

Reduction in kWh usage

377,280

kWh avoided, cumulative

$17,005

Direct energy savings

44

Nine-year-old Trane RTUs · 215.5 tons

The age of the equipment is the point. A 21.52% reduction on nine-year-old rooftop units is evidence that the process reverses efficiency already lost, which puts it in the refurbishment column rather than the new-build protectant column — and refurbishment is where the CapEx argument lives.

Commercial HVAC technical brief (PDF) ↓

Third-party tested

1008 hrs

cyclic salt fog & UV exposure

Per ASTM D5894-21, graded per ASTM D714 for blistering and D610 for rusting. Testing by KTA-Tator Inc., project no. 66077381. This is the evidence behind the asset-life half of the case.

Documented result

45.3°

supply-air split after coating

Waffle House #265, Phoenix. A 15-year-old 5-ton rooftop unit read 13.3° before cleaning, 20.4° after cleaning and 45.3° once coated. Run times fell by more than 50%.

Documented result · Cleaner only

$2,400

a year in hydrojetting, eliminated

Original Pancake House, Park Ridge, Illinois — SIMIX Peroxide Cleaner on its own, no coating. Five locations over four years: 60–70% lower cleaning costs, and the quarterly drain hydrojetting contract gone entirely.

Every documented result, with sources →

Decarbonisation

Carbon separation against carbon capture

Carbon capture and storage is the route favoured where the capital base is already enormous. For a facilities portfolio it is the wrong shape of spend: high complexity, high cost, and an operating expense tail that never ends. Surface-level carbon separation is a different instrument with a different cost curve.

	Carbon capture & storage	SIMIX carbon separation
Cost shape	Capital-intensive infrastructure	One-time, low-cost application
Ongoing expense	Compression, transport, storage, monitoring	Virtually none
Complexity	High — dedicated systems and permits	Applied to surfaces you already own
Mechanism	Capture and sequester the gas	Photocatalytic breakdown at the surface
Secondary benefit	None to the facility	Lower kWh and deferred replacement

Comparison reflects SIMIX's positioning of the two approaches, not a formal lifecycle assessment.

Multimeter and inspection clipboard resting on a rooftop HVAC cabinet during a facility energy audit

THE SCOPE 1 ANGLE

Because the reaction runs on the surfaces of assets you already operate, the effect sits inside your own boundary rather than in a purchased offset. For an operator with a large roof or a large rooftop unit population, that is the difference between reporting a reduction and buying one.