Biofuel. Bricks. Paper. Beauty products. A carbon capture system.
Many Caribbean entrepreneurs see an unprecedented economic opportunity in the sargassum that has regularly swamped the region since 2011.
But despite their enthusiastic pitches — and widespread consensus that the only realistic solution to the crisis is monetising the seaweed — no consistent large-scale use for it has been found.
“Even though there are so many things you can make with sargassum, the actual amount of sargassum that is used for products is still very low,” said Dr. Franziska Elmer, a Mexico-based scientific project manager for the United Kingdom-headquartered carbon solutions company Seafields.
As a result, sargassum is usually handled as waste, with annual costs for clean-up and disposal estimated by researchers in the region to be as high as $210 million in the Caribbean.
Companies like Seafields hope to change that. In recent years, entrepreneurs and researchers have doggedly sought the secret to turning sargassum into “brown gold,” as professor Dr. Mona Webber, from the Mona Campus of the University of the West Indies in Jamaica, likes to call the seaweed.
The United Kingdom-based company Seafields is working to build aquatic farms that store sargassum in enclosed paddocks like the one shown above in St. Vincent and the Grenadines last year. (Photo: SEAFIELDS)
But daunting challenges remain to finding a profitable business that will make a sizable dent in the millions of tons of sargassum that wash up on the region’s shorelines each year.
Entrepreneurs who spoke to the Puerto Rico Centro de Periodismo Investigativo (Center of Investigative Journalism) described operating in a largely unregulated environment where information is patchy and funding is hard to find.
Benjamin Jelen is a research and development director at C-Combinator in Cataño, Puerto Rico, which studies the potential use of sargassum-derived products. (Photo by XAVIER GARCIA EL PAÍS)
Currently, the research team is working on refining the process in hopes of producing a better-quality paper.
But there are many challenges. Last year, for instance, a large sargassum influx predicted early in the year never came.
“Precisely when I need sargassum is when it doesn’t arrive,” Dr. Gavio said.
Nevertheless, she hopes that their efforts will eventually provide the islands with sustainable solutions to a major problem that has threatened their tourism industry and other aspects of life.
“The only one working on it is me,” she said, adding, “Right now, the treatment when it arrives is to dump it in a landfill, but it is not a long-term solution.”
Solutions
The Oxenford study offered dozens of recommendation for lifting the obstacles blocking sargassum entrepreneurs: improving forecasting systems; using government subsidies to facilitate marketing; improving harvesting and transportation systems; developing safety standards; devising better storage methods and other ways to ensure a steady supply; encouraging “sargassum industrial parks,” and many others.
But none of these steps, the researchers noted, will work if taken in isolation.
“It is recommended that the solutions and actions proposed are integrated into a regional strategy and action plan that promotes valorisation as an economic opportunity and as a means of alleviating influx impacts,” they wrote.
Otherwise, the researchers predicted a bleak future.
“The evidence suggests that although efforts to explore opportunities in the Caribbean are well underway, sargassum influxes will remain more of a hazard than a benefit unless current constraints are adequately addressed,” they stated.
This investigation is the result of a fellowship awarded by the Center for Investigative Journalism’s Training Institute and was made possible in part with the support of Open Society Foundations.
