Freddy Gonzalez

The key to confronting the modern world’s waste and energy challenges is to fully grasp the problem, says mechanical engineer Freddy Gonzalez.

Freddy's entrepreneurial urges have sent him on a course from his Chilean home to Auckland to Austria – about 30,000km as the crow flies.

The European nation is where Vertus Energy, the company he co-founded in Auckland, has struck a partnership deal to set up a pilot waste-to-energy plant.

On the one hand, Freddy, who is the company’s chief engineer, never imagined one day opening a plant in Austria, and on the other hand, he’s someone who likes an adventure.

“When I came to Auckland it was just to stay for a year before returning to Chile. I never expected to be opening a company in New Zealand, let alone starting operations in Austria.”

But travel – especially of the intrepid kind – is something he likes, although his usual mode is cycling.

Recycling, of a sort, is the business Vertus is in. It builds reactors for converting waste to energy and its BRIO unit is being trialled on a commercial scale by Austrian-based Biogest.

That will get Vertus a foot in the door of a global bioenergy market that Fortune Business Insights projects to be worth $642 billion by 2027.

Freddy, who set up Vertus in 2021 with three partners, is an experienced hydrogen-reactor builder. In 2018 he enrolled in a Master of Engineering Studies at the University of Auckland, specialising in Mechanical Engineering.

“After years working as a mechanical and project engineer, the masters was a way to reconnect with two things I have always enjoyed or at least was curious about – those are research and entrepreneurship.”

Both are highly relevant at Vertus, he says.

Although Freddy’s goal is to help Vertus reach commercial scale, just as important is building a culture that translates the company’s environmental aspirations into actions. Being in tune with his co-founders is a big part of that.

“The Vertus team has an important influence on my life. I have learnt a lot from them directly or indirectly.

“But beyond that, such authors and thinkers as Jorge Sabato, Claudio Naranjo and others have been influential for me. I see myself as a seeker of understanding.”

At Vertus he plays the crucial role of transforming concepts into tangible forms. Two things stand out for him as being essential in bringing that about.

“One is the importance of understanding the problem – that’s when the value of the solution is fully comprehended. From there to a potential innovation or product is just a couple of extra steps.

“Another thing I have learnt lately is how important it is to understand others – to have the time and room to get where others are coming from.”

That’s of particular value for team collaboration “which is of course needed in any project”, Freddy says.

Would he have predicted where his mechanical engineering qualifications are taking him?

“In a broad sense, my career has evolved along the lines I expected. I was always curious about energy, efficiency, fuels and their links to society.”

Is there a personal attribute that drives him?

“I would say I am very critical. I like to get to the root cause of problems and to try to find solutions from there.

“I love to read and to understand how things work. Getting paid for doing that has been a great opportunity and I am very grateful. But the real reward comes from applying what I learn to our projects.”

There’s a project unrelated to Vertus that Freddy has recently taken on that calls for some quite different skills and offers different rewards.

“I recently became father to Martin and I am really enjoying that new part of my life.”