[Terrapreta] About Message Ron Larson Mon, 26 Mar 2007

[Ron Larson]

To Dr.  Yury   (cc "stoves", "terrapreta" list members)

[RWL1:  Background:  Dr. Yury is responding to a short message I sent to "stoves" on the 26th on the subject of charcoaling in the cropfield (encouraging that), responding to a message from Dr. A.D. Karve - who has been successful in this practice in the Maharashtra state of India.  I stated on the 26th that I thought this practice could/would shift over time to a use of the char for "terrapreta" purposes, rather than (as at present) its use for charcoal briquettes and household cooking (and Dr. Karve has developed a very efficient charcoal burning stove, whose success has led to a local charcoal shortage.)  
    Dr. Yury and I met in Pune India at a first stoves conference (organized by Dr. Karve's daughter Priya) some years ago and have had several e-mail conversations since.   It was obvious to all at the conference that Dr. Yury (who had just retired from government service to form his own charcoal-making enterprise) was very knowledgeable about charcoal-making.  His communication below is much more clear than earlier dialogs - showing that computer translations from Russian to English are getting much better.  I urge going to the site given below {  http://www.repp.org/discussiongroups/resources/stoves/Yudkevitch/charcoal/}  [which actually takes your directly to the very active Russian site.  where much (not enough) is in English.  This is our first conversation about "terra preta"]

----- Original Message ----- 
From: "Юрий Юдкевич" <charwood at rambler.ru>
To: <stoves at listserv.repp.org>
Cc: <rongretlarson at comcast.net>
Sent: Tuesday, March 27, 2007 11:45 PM
Subject: About Message Ron Larson Mon, 26 Mar 2007 


> Dear Ron,
> The compounding of the combined fertilizers included a coal dust 
> necessarily in former Soviet Union. It has stopped, when collective 
> farms have broken and the country  has returned to farmer system. 
        [RWL2.   Dr.  Yury - as in the message just sent to Andrew,  I am uncertain about your use of the word "coal" here.  Is this "biochar" such as you now produce - or what Americans call that coming from (mined from) the ground?  This is a hugely important difference for the future of "terra preta" work (placing biochar in the ground).  If you mean "mined coal", then I believe many "terrapreta" soil scientists will need urgently to add this product to their experimental program (since it is so cheap).   iI you (or the computer translater) mean "biochar",  many on the terrapreta list will want to know how we can learn about any Russian scientific studies.  In either case, it will be most important to know why the practice was stopped.]

>The 
> potato of that time had no apertures from wreckers never. The farmer 
> potato has such apertures today. It concerns also other root crops. 
        [RWL3:  Again, Yury, this is not understandable by me.  Could you expand (use a longer list of Russian words)?

>The 
> big work has been made in 80 years on use of a coal dust in vineyards. 
> Good results were available. 
>I remember, that it is a lot of information 
> on use of coal in an agriculture was in the Russian periodic literature 
> of the third quarter of the twentieth century. 
        [RWL4:  This sounds very important.  Anything more you can add should be very helpful to the world's soil scientists - no matter what your Russian version of  my "coal" means.

>We try to propagandize 
> these ideas now again and we make small successes.
      [RWL5:  Now I am pretty sure you are only meaning "biochar" - so this is very exciting.  Know of anything in the English language on this type of work in Russia?   What percentage of your current biochar production might be used for agricultural purposes.?   Are you shipping any biochar/charcoal to any other countries for agriculture reasons?  (To others,  I believe most (or all) of Yury's biochar production is in Siberia - close to China.  Dr. Yury lives in St. Petersburg.  I believe Dr. Yury is interested in export sales of his hardware.)
> 
> Syncerely yours
> Dr. Yury Yudkevich, main technologist
> "Bioenergy LLC"
> http://www.repp.org/discussiongroups/resources/stoves/Yudkevitch/charcoal/
>

RWL6:  Dr. Yury:    Congratulations on your excellent web site - which seems much enlarged from my last visit a year or two ago.   I especially like the new pyrolysis classification scheme you have sketched out.  I will respond separately on that - and on the several web sites you have posted.  Here's hoping we can have more such fruitful conversations.  My apologies for not knowing how to send this letter in Russian - so please let me know if I need to re-describe anything.

Regards      Ron
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