[Terrapreta] Charcoal costs

[Kevin Chisholm]

Dear Nikolaus

I don't know, but I would pose for your consideration that a major 
benefit of char is its potential to increase the Cation Exchange 
Capacity of the soil, but that Torrified Wood has the Cation Exchange 
sites tied up, and that it would not work a effectively as char.

Another way of looking at it would be that "Activated Charcoal is more 
reactive than charcoal that is not activated, but even "regular" 
charcoal is more active than Torrified wood."

Does this make sense?

Best wishes,

Kevin





Nikolaus Foidl wrote:
> Dear all!
>
> My charcoal costs at a charring efficiency of 42 % is around 35 US$ per ton
> Charcoal. Now after analyzing 15 year old soil where huge amounts of forest
> where simply burned and charred. Now excavating I find huge amounts of only
> torrefied wood pieces which as well did not degrade, like the charcoal
> chunks.
> Now looking at this and if torrefied wood would do the same as is charcoal,
> why not save a huge amount of additional CO2 and just torrefy the stuff and
> mill it and then burry it? Cost per ton would drop to half, CO2 taken out of
> the atmosphere rise by 50 to 70 %.
> Just an idea but maybe worth to be discussed.
> Best regards Nikolaus
>
>
>
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