Carbon: The Biochar Solution

[Fledermaus]

On his farm in the hills of west virginia, Josh Frye isn't raising chickens just for meat. He is also raising them for their manure. Through a process that some scientists tout as a solution to climate change, food shortages and the energy crisis, Frye is transforming the waste into a charcoal-like substance called biochar that in the long run could be far better for the world than chicken nuggets. "It might look like this is just a poultry farm," says Frye. "But it's a char farm too."

Biochar's ability to sequester CO2 has given new urgency to such research. "Reducing emissions isn't enough — we have to draw down the carbon stock in the atmosphere," says Tim Flannery, chair of the Copenhagen Climate Council, a consortium of scientists and business leaders linked to next year's United Nations Climate Summit. "And for that, slow pyrolysis biochar is a superior solution to anything else that's been proposed." Cornell's Lehmann is even more emphatic. "If biochar could be massively applied around the globe," he says, "we could end the emissions problem in one to two years."

Not everyone agrees. "Biochar isn't a silver bullet, not by a long shot," says Dominic Woolf, a researcher at Swansea University in Wales. "You have to look at the big picture: pyrolysis itself produces carbon dioxide emissions, and you have to consider that when you try to determine biochar's capacity for sequestration." Lehmann says he welcomes the doubts, and notes that addressing them requires "investors willing to take the risk." Which is where chicken farmer Frye, with his small biochar operation, comes in as one of the few people out there actually making a business of it. With a pyrolysis unit that can create 3-4 tons of biochar a day, he generates enough energy to heat his hen houses; and he sells the char as fertilizer for $600 a ton. For Lehmann, biochar's benefits aren't so much a scientific novelty as a return to basics. "From cave drawings to iron smelting, charcoal has always played an important role in the development of civilization," he says. "Maybe it's about to do it again."
http://www.time.com/time/magazine/article/0,9171,1864279,00.html

[elocs]

1. There really is no silver bullet that will provide the energy which oil provides

and as simply and easily as oil has provided it for decades. There is no one thing now to replace oil that will give us a perfect picture, but there will be a combination of many things which can give us a good picture.

[HamdenRice]

2. Biochar may be a solution to soil fertility/sustainable agriculture ...

but not to carbon sequestration. On balance it has no effect on CO2 in the atmosphere. But it's use in creating low till agriculture seems promising.

[bananas]

3. Biochar can be used for sequestration

http://opa.yale.edu/news/article.aspx?id=6199&s=t


You can download the report and supplementary material
by going to http://www.bentham.org/open/toascj/openaccess2.htm

Click on "Volume 2 Click here to view the contents(Year 2008)"

Scroll down and click on the third from last entry:
"Target Atmospheric CO2: Where Should Humanity Aim?
pp.217-231 (15) Authors: James Hansen, Makiko Sato, Pushker Kharecha, David Beerling, Robert Berner, Valerie Masson-Delmotte, Mark Pagani, Maureen Raymo, Dana L. Royer, James C. Zachos"

Then click on both the "Download"
and "Supplementary Material" buttons.

[AlecBGreen]

4. incorrect

"On balance it has no effect on CO2 in the atmosphere..."

Here's how it works. A plant grows by using atmospheric carbon dioxide to create organic matter. When it dies, it rots and the vast majority of the co2 is re-released but a tiny fraction remains as stable soil organic matter (humus). PYROLYSIS takes organic matter and turns it into charcoal, a very stable form of carbon. The charcoal is buried and remains in the soil.

So... CO2 LEAVES the atmosphere (via the plant) and ENTERS the soil (as charcoal). This process is a NET REDUCTION in atmospheric carbon dioxide.

[jkalember]

5. A simple step!

TAX BEEF! A carbon tax on beef is a no-brainer, with even the Bush administration admitting that the industry is responsible for more warming emissions than automobiles. Use the proceeds for preventive public healthcare. Just do it, especially in California.