eCoal | Jamaican engineer from Old Harbour creates sargassum charcoal

But with the world now moving away from coal, one Jamaican engineer has found a new way to create a modern version of the burning fuel, one that is cleaner, cheaper and friendlier to the environment.

At the backend of this year’s summer, Old Harbour native Daveian Morrison had many nationals, and indeed business interest groups, in awe when he created goat feed using the obnoxious and invasive seaweed sargassum.

Morrison’s goat feed invention saw him being Jamaica’s representative at the world’s largest green business ideas competition – ClimateLaunchpad. Jamaica’s and that of Morrison’s remarkable run ended at the semi-finals from a competitive field of 54 nations.

Fast forward to now and Morrison is back in the news with yet another fascinating invention – eCoal or sargassum charcoal – which is a combination of dried sargassum and other waste materials.

“This is charcoal briquette similar to what you’ll find in America where you do barbecue. So it’s dustless and smokeless,” Morrison said in an Old Harbour News exclusive.

“The idea came about in trying to find a total solution to sargassum,” added the Old Harbour High alum. “So what we use in our feed is fresh sargassum, but what about the majority of it which is on the beach rotting. So I said ‘OK let me find a solution for that’ and that was how the idea was borne.”

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At the Inter-American Development Bank (IDB) 60th Anniversary recently held in Kingston, Morrison had the opportunity to display his new creation. The feedback was very positive.

“A marine biologist from the IDB said they will be interested to work with this because in the Portland Bight Protected Area people are cutting down mangroves to burn coal. So we are to explore doing a scale production of it. The minister (of finance Dr Nigel Clarke) himself is saying that the idea is scalable,” said Morrison, founder and managing director of Awganic Inputs.

With sargassum being the main raw material source for his two inventions, the business community, especially the tourism sector, could soon be breathing a collective sigh of relief.

“So what we have done now is to provide a 100% solution to seaweed (sargassum) for whatever state it is in whether fresh or decay, we can handle it,” he said.

Catch phrases such as ‘cleaner coal’, once scuffed at by environmentalists, are likely to be embraced now with Morrison’s eCoal invention which seems to tick all the right boxes, including the economics of it.

“Because it is denser than regular wood it burns longer and supply more heat,” the engineer said.

Morrison continued: “So we are anticipating that it would be a great thing for our local jerk market, which essentially is done with coal. Not only that we are looking to the households and persons being able to enjoy our cultural cuisines and not having to deal with the dust associated with regular charcoal.”

Though he and his team are yet to start crunching the actual numbers, Morrison, who has a bachelor’s degree in electrical engineering, said they will be targeting the high-end of the coal market where imported coal briquette fetches a decent price locally. The team will also diversify the product by creating pimento-infused charcoal to add a little flavour to the mix.

“What we want to do is to target the upscale market,” he said. “Just to be clear: If I’m using it on a pot in will not smoke, but in terms of barbecue it will still smoke because smoke in the barbecue is actually the fats from the meat dripping on the coal.

“We have also coming on stream the pimento version where we will take the waste from the pimento industry and infuse that to make pimento-flavoured charcoal.

“So we’ll have two versions: the plain one and the pimento version. The pimento version will definitely be in competition for those imported ones in which a typical bag sells at 700-and-something dollars.

“So whatever is sold for $700 we want to go in at maybe $350, $300, $400… and that bag is usually sold by the weight and not by the volume. So our typical bag comparing to the imported shouldn’t be more than $300,” he assessed.  

Morrison said eCoal is inspired by his late grandfather – Vernal Wildman, who use to burn coal for a living in the Bodles area.

“I use to sit and watch him and help him sometimes, and just in awe of how this man single-handedly was doing all of this,” he told Harbour News. “At that time I think he was in his seventies and I said to myself ‘no man, we have to go find a better way. So this is paying homage to him.”