Permachar
At the heart of anthropogenic climate change is the Carbon Cycle out of balance. After almost 300 years of Industrialisation, so much Carbon has been released into the atmosphere that the Carbon
Cycle is now at breaking point with atmospheric Carbon emissions dominating the greenhouse gases that are heating up the climate. Many INGOs, Nations, NGOs, businesses and individuals are moving
fast to permanently remove these Carbon emissions already up there and avoid creating new Carbon emissions.
A whole new industry has sprung up known as the 'Carbon Removal Marketplace' or CRM. There are a number of Carbon removal technologies being used with variable complexity of the methodologies
used to Measure, Report and Verify them for awarding Carbon Dioxide Removal (CDR) or Biochar Carbon Removal (BCR) credits. The majority of credits issued and purchased (~90%) have been for
biochar, a form of biological charcoal that is produced from biomass (waste) with fire in a limited Oxygen environment in a process known as pyrolysis. Research in 2023 suggests that biochar, if
meeting the 'Interinite Benchmark', can have a half life of 100 million years!
Biochar is not new. Around 2500 BP (Before Present) biochar was produced by Pre-Columbian Indians in the Amazon rainforest in the form of Terra Preta de Indio, or Amazon Dark Earth (ADE). I
suggest reading this fascinating overview found here:
https://www.intechopen.com/chapters/73242
In the 1980s aerial studies were performed over the ADE region and mapped an area the size of France. ADE was, and still is, incredibly fertile with robust water adsorption and slow release
capability, habitat for soil microbes, increased soil porosity and structure, enhanced Cation Exchange Capacity and reduction in Nitrous Oxide (NOx) and methane (CH4) emissions from the soil. In
2004-2005, 'biochar' was coined by Peter Read, a Kiwi climate scientist and research fellow at Massey University, New Zealand, to describe charcoal made from biomass intended for agricultural
use. The term was adopted by The International Biochar Initiative, formed following the First International Agrichar Conference held in 2007, and, in my opinion, the 'Biochar Revolution' had
begun. Dr Paul Taylor later wrote a book called 'The Biochar Revolution' with early case studies and tips and tricks - I'm selling them cheap if you want a copy...
In 2009, while studying a Diploma of Permaculture, I met the late Geoff Moxham living in Northern New South Wales in Australia who was researching biochar to raise awareness and demonstrated a
small biochar-producing Top-Lit UpDraft stove (TLUD, pyroneered by Paul B. Wendelbo, Dr Thomas B. Reed and Dr Paul S. Anderson (Dr TLUD)). I was fascinated by the technology and began building
them, eventually upcycling a water heater into a TLUD for my main project. I finished my Diploma in 2010, went to Nepal and promoted biochar through SADP, an agricultural NGO. Hans-Peter Schmidt
later built a Citizen Science program in Nepal and popularised the Kon-Tiki biochar kilns. I returned to Australia then started designing and building more TLUDs and biochar kilns, including the
Pyramid (designed by Kelpie Wilson which I modded - she also pioneered the 'Ring of Fire' flame cap biochar kiln), Kon-Tiki cone kiln (pioneered by Hans-Peter Schmidt and Dr Paul Taylor - which I
also modded), and many flatpacked variations of 'Flame cap' biochar kilns, including the 'Flat Modular Biochar Kiln' that has been improved upon with my latest kiln design, the Flame Cap
'Algorithm' Panel Kiln (co-designed with Dr TLUD), which can be used at the small to medium scale, in field with expandable volume and flatpacked logistics with the potential for Biochar Carbon
Credits using a yet to be built thermal imagery based dMRV. My latest TLUDs are the DIY Navigator series - simple to grind off stainless steel tube eg. Chimney flue, exhaust, tube. My latest
design is on the 'Bush Survival System' page, called the Navigator 'Awesome' which is still under testing. So, the technologies are continually improving, becoming more appropriate on the small
to medium scale and bigger at the large scale eg. ECHO2, CharCell and adoption is now widespread around the world and increasing exponentially. What's probably more important than biochar
production technology is biochar application.
What can it be used for?
The main applications, in my opinion, are growing systems eg.agriculture, forestry, agroforestry (trees, swales and Zai pits), horticulture (greenhouse growing media) etc., cooking and WASH
(water pasteurization on a TLUD produces Biochar that can then be used in water filtration (if needed), sanitation (Biochar and bokashi) and hygiene (clean water)). Hard infrastructure eg.
charcrete, asphalt, hempcharcrete etc is also a major application now, which can use biochar after it has been applied to water filtration adsorbing dyes, heavy metals, industrial chemicals,
agricultural chemicals, antibiotics and more that renders biochar unsuitable for growing systems. Biochar can also be used as a filler eg. resins, Carbon fibre and more. It can be used for
electromagnetic radiation shielding, doped/undoped for battery anodes and also supercapacitors. The list keeps growing. Biochar materials science, mainly carried out in China, is on the cutting
edge of biochar R&D.
With all these existing and new applications, it's possible and plausible that by 2030 biochar Carbon removal could be on the Gigaton scale at the global level, accelerated by Government policies
eg. Denmark has a 'National Pyrolysis Strategy', and CDR/BCR credits, mentioned earlier, purchased from the people that make the biochar aka the 'Charistas' with a CRM platform
eg.carbonfuture.earth, puro.earth, HCS etc. operating between the credit purchaser and the Charista. With all this excitement around biochar, it's important to remember that permanent Carbon
removal is half of the equation - the other half is reducing Carbon emissions. Fossil fuel combustion is roughly responsible for 90% of global Carbon emissions (according to the UN but there's
also a load of statistics out there if you are interested?). Can biochar replace fossil fuel? Kind of. Transport, for example, is moving towards electrification and biochar anodes can be used in
batteries. Potentially too, biomass to biochar bioelectricity technology, on or off grid, could be charging car batteries when stationary. There are also many chemicals and plastics produced from
fossil fuels. Biochar should be able to make some inroads here such as reducing/displacing the number of fossil-based chemicals and fertilisers in agriculture. Also, work is being done in the
plastic space, where pyrolysed plastic eg. using Gallium Nitride (GaN) based Microwave Assisted Pyrolysis (MAP), can be used as a precursor for advanced Carbon materials. MAP can also produce
bio-oil, as a by-product of pyrolysis, for monomers to produce new plastic or production of Ultra Low Sulfur Diesel.
I'm predicting that in the future, biochar and biochar-based materials will be ubiquitous, pioneered by many new production technologies, materials and projects, which gives me some hope. I
believe 'Biochar Civilisation' can take humanity far further than the Amazonian Indians could have ever dreamed of but will the Carbon Cycle be rebalanced in time before Climate Change runs away?
More science still needs to be done in the biochar field, which is now trans-disciplinary, but I guess researching biochar (try the 'Farmers Guide' at ANZBIG, by Professor Stephen Joseph and Dr
Paul Taylor), making biochar or investing in 'Charistas' is a great starting point if you're not doing it already. Many online (and offline eg. 'Burn: Using Fire to Cool the Earth', by Albert
Bates and Kathleen Draper) resources are now availabe. Something to think about and get involved in. Thanks for your time!
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