Turntide believes it has the next great innovation in the world's efforts to slow global climate change -- a better electric motor. The operation of buildings is responsible for 40 percent of CO2 emissions worldwide and a third of the energy used in commercial buildings is wasted.

Smart building technology adds an intelligent layer to eliminate this waste and inefficiency by automatically controlling lighting, air conditioning, heating, ventilation, and other essential systems and Turntide's electric motors can add additional savings.

Turntide's basic innovation is a software-controlled motor, or switch reluctance motor, that uses precise pulses of energy instead of a constant flow of electricity.

"In a conventional motor, you are continuously driving current into the motor whatever speed you want to run it at. We're pulsing in precise amounts of current just at the times when you need the torque... It's software-defined hardware."

He estimates that the technology is applicable to 95 percent of where electric motors are used today, but the initial focus will be on smart buildings because it's the easiest place to start and can have some of the largest immediate impacts on energy usage.

"The carbon impact of what we're doing is pretty massive," Morris told me last year. "The average energy reduction in buildings has been a 64 percent reduction. If we can replace all the motors in buildings in the US that's the carbon equivalent of adding over 300 million tons of carbon sequestration per year."