“I’ve never been as excited about a job as I am now.”
Ehsan Moslehi graduated in chemical technology in his homeland of Iran. It was the courses in environmental technology that aroused his interest, but it was when he realised that environmental issues still took a back seat in Iran that Ehsan started to look to Scandinavia. Here he saw environmental issues being taken seriously and industry making major advances.
KTH brought Ehsan to Sweden and EasyMining
In 2016, when Ehsan was admitted to KTH, he decided to move to Sweden. He graduated two years later and started working for RISE (Research Institutes of Sweden). After three years he saw an interesting job advertisement.
– I’d heard some talk about Ash2Phos technology and I thought it would be an exciting place to work – a fast-moving, creative environment where everyone’s views are valued and taken seriously. It was a challenge and a role that came to me at just the right time. Yariv Cohen, head of R&D at EasyMining in Uppsala, invited me to come in for a coffee and a chat with a number of employees at the company and after that meeting accepting the job was a ‘no brainer’, says Ehsan.
Since January 2021, Ehsan has been one of the motivated engineers at EasyMining and now, almost six months later, he can confirm that the job comes up to all his high expectations.
Conducting experiments in Pilot 6
Ehsan works primarily on Pilot 6, an important project as part of the realisation of Ash2Phos technology – a process that converts sludge ash into a raw material for phosphorous extraction and so forms an important part of a circular solution for phosphorous processing. Ehsan and his colleagues in Uppsala design and conduct experiments in which the pilot produces products to be sold by future Ash2Phos factories. The product samples are sent to potential customers where they are evaluated for various applications. The aim – and the hope – is to optimise marketing opportunities and establish smart partnerships with downstream customers who use recycled products to reduce their environmental impact.
Ehsan and his colleagues design and conduct experiments in a pilot project within EasyMinings Ash2Phos technology. From left: Stephan Liefeldt, Viktoria Westlund, Ehsan Moslehi and Harshad Pathak.
“We all know how lucky we are to be working on a project like this.”
– There were a lot of us who started working on the project at the same time. Thanks to an in-house training programme, we quickly learnt how to work and operate. It’s a great success that we went from just having heard about Ash2Phos, to working on and soon completing the current pilot in such a short time, says Ehsan.
– No two days are alike and there are always new challenges that require new solutions. That’s one of the things that make my job so interesting and exciting. Like the fact that we are working on something that will play such a large and significant role for the environment – and there aren’t a lot of engineers who can say that, he adds.
A multinational Swedish workplace culture
Ehsan has colleagues from many different countries, such as Germany, the Netherlands, India and Greece.
– All of us have adopted the Swedish workplace culture, and there is a lot of mutual respect and consideration amongst us. Because we spend so much time together on the project, we’ve got to know each other really well. We also spend time together outside of work, when we try to talk about something other than our work, says Ehsan with a smile.
First of all, a big cake!
As soon as one project ends, a new one begins. Ehsan and his colleagues have already started planning the next project after the summer – also part of the Ash2Phos process. In the meantime however, the delivery of Pilot 6 needs to be celebrated with a big cake!
Before Ehsan decided to try living in Sweden, all he knew about this small country was IKEA, meatballs, and that it is cold and extremely dark. Now he appreciates the countryside and the forests and he is living a good and active life with his girlfriend in Stockholm. Ehsan has no plans to leave Sweden. Instead he is looking forward to the next challenge at EasyMining, to resuming his annual visits to his family in Iran soon, and in the meantime to going on long walks, playing badminton and using his commute between Stockholm and Uppsala to read more books!