[Terrapreta] The Reason for Pottery Shards in Terra Preta. Re: Char and compost ( was Char made made under pressurized conditions? )

[lou gold]

david,

i can't imagine it following this causal chain. the need to deal with human
waste was a necessity long before other functions emerged. and this need
would have produced lots of pottery as population density grew.

i think that the agricultural benefits emerged according to "grass is
greener" observations and the process of growing a high-density urban
civilization in the forest brought everything together.

it seems to me to be a very "natural" process. but, of course, i also am
speculating.

lou
On Wed, Apr 2, 2008 at 8:16 AM, David Hirst .com <david at davidhirst.com>
wrote:

>  Is it possible that the pottery pots were used in the manufacturing
> process? When full of stuff, it was set light, sealed up, and then smashed
> open as part of the spreading process. Could it be that the pottery baking
> was a by-product of the char-making? Could the clay have been a soft,
> unbaked lining to a wooden container?
>
> Pure speculation, of course.
>
> David
>
>
>
> *David Hirst*
>
> direct:     +44 (0) 1723 570113
>
> mobile:   +44 (0) 7831 405443
>
> email:     david at davidhirst.com <.david at davidhirst.com>
>
> *From:* terrapreta-bounces at bioenergylists.org [mailto:
> terrapreta-bounces at bioenergylists.org] *On Behalf Of *lou gold
> *Sent:* 02 April 2008 11:54
> *To:* MMBTUPR at aol.com
> *Cc:* terrapreta at bioenergylists.org
> *Subject:* Re: [Terrapreta] The Reason for Pottery Shards in Terra Preta.
> Re: Char and compost ( was Char made made under pressurized conditions? )
>
>
>
> Another good guess, I believe.
>
> If you look at the images in the BBC documentary of the "cut-away" terra
> preta dig, it really looks like a honeycomb structure.
>
> And the density of shards is amazing. I wondered why? What function and
> why so many? If you consider the population densities reported by Francisco
> de Orellana (for example, a stretch of river where people were living
> house-pressed-to-house for 20 miles) and the normal volumes of human waste,
> it is easy to imagine huge amounts of pottery shards.
>
> It seems to all be coming together, thanks to everyones' speculation.
>
> On Wed, Apr 2, 2008 at 7:29 AM, <MMBTUPR at aol.com> wrote:
>
>                from          Lewis L Smith
>
> The case of the pottery shards and the role of urine in terra preta is
> fascinating.  Congratulations to all on a fine piece of "detective work".
>
> However, a question sticks in my mind. Did the presence of lots of shards
> in terra preta accidentally contribute to the effectiveness of the ongoing
> chemical processes ?
>
> In Puerto Rico, researchers at the Bacardí rum distillery learned that
> microbes which "snip" big molecules into smaller ones, like to "sit down"
> while they do their work. So they greatly improved the efficiency of the
> Company's digester for distillation slops by placing a honeycomb like
> structure within in it. Without taking up a lot of volume, this structure
> greatly increased the available surface area to which microbes could attach
> themselves.
>
> I also recall from research into ocean-thermal energy conversion by a
> former client, that there was a considerable loss of transfer efficiency in
> the heat exchangers because the microbes in the sea water like to attach
> themselves to the available surfaces rather than float around.
>
> [ The solution turned out to be pretty simple. Every so often clean the
> insides of the heat exchangers with a pots-and-pans cleanser, such as Ajax.
> ]
>
> Query :  Is it possible that the surfaces of the shards contributed to the
> terra-preta processes in an analogous fashion ?
>
> Cordially.
>
>
> **************
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