Esteban Amaro, director of the Monitoring Network of Quintana Roo Sargassum, agrees on the fact that the fuel is the best product to concentrate on. Algae elaboration is possible in other consumer products, but not recommended since the health risks of doing so have not yet been sufficiently studied.
“I believe that the purpose of Sargassum is to produce energy, because when it decomposes, it releases many heavy metals such as arsenic, lead and cadmium,” says Amaro. “Therefore it is better to produce biofuels or biogas than daily products such as clothing or shoes.”
A potential source of carbon credits
In the race to dispose of Sargassum, there is another practical product –Sargapanel, A building material developed by researchers from the National Autonomous University of Mexico (Unam). These panels use between 60 and 70 kilos of Sargassum wet per piece and offer several advantages compared to conventional panels: the material is about 33 % more flexible, has greater impact resistance and is a fire delay. Furthermore, in its production, no chemical additives are used, therefore it can be recycled: once its life cycle is finished, it can be destroyed and reinstated in the production line.
“With this project, we not only contribute to reducing the problem … we also generate profits from carbon credits. For every 5 tons of Sargassum wet, a carbon credit is generated and each credit is between $ 10 and $ 30”, says Miriam Estévez González, head of the group that developed Sargapanel Unam for applied and querétaro physics.
Estévez estimates that if 4,000 tons of dry sargassum were developed in panels every year, this would generate an annual profit between $ 80,000 and $ 240,000, as well as absorbing the equivalent of 8,000 tons of CO2. “By making a comparison, we remove from the circulation of about a thousand cars,” he says.
Cfata scientists, in collaboration with academics of other Unam departments, have also developed many other products, including Sargabox, cabinet packaging boxes that are also resistant to fire, as well as filters that can be used to remove contaminants from the water, including microplastics.
“In the case of Sargapanel, we already have the necessary scientific studies and a fully competitive recorded and scalable model of utility and scalable and we are approaching some companies that are a leader in building materials,” says Estévez.
On February 28, the governor of the State of Quintana Roo, Mara Lezama Espinosa, announced the formation of the Sargasso Center for hygienic services -Sanitary and economic circularwhose goal is to move macroalgaes from being considered a pollution problem to be used as an economic and environmental resource. If transformed into long -lasting physical products, Sargassum can block carbon that draws from the environment to grow; If transformed into a biofuel, it can avoid some emissions of fossil fuels.
The Center will mainly promote the use of Sargassum to produce biogas and organic fertilizers, replacements for products that usually translate into greenhouse gases that are released and used. The center will then sell carbon credits on the back of these emissions reductions.
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