[Terrapreta] a paper quantatifying the GHG load of various carbon pathways back to atmosphere

[jim mason]

http://allpowerlabs.org/papers/GHGPathwaysStudyPacInst.pdf

here finally is a paper that attempts to represent the ghg load/life
of various pathways of biomass carbon back to atmosphere.  (for those
new here, remember, all the carbon in solid biomass is going to back
to gas in the atmoshere in the end.  there is no stasis here, only
cycle.  however, the form it will take, and the time it will take to
do so can vary greatly: ch4, co, c02, and with indirect relationships
to amounts of no2, nox, h2o, etc.)

there is a great graphic on page six that shows the relative ghg
impact of uncontrolled burning, bad landfill, good landfill,
composting (anerobic) , spead composting (aerobic), biomass energy,
etc on the transformation of biomass carbon to various gases with
various ghg impacts.  the graph well shows the impact of the increased
ch4 of composting, and once again proves that hippies are bad and
should all be gasified (ideally with a partial biochar take off and
careful remediation of the toxic heavy metal ash byproducts).

as we all know, it is very difficult to make arguments for thermal
based biomass curation/reduction scenarios with the current "no
burning" biases of most environmental discussions.  clear framing of
the options and ghg consequences like herein should do much to
enrichen the conversation and advance the science and art of burning
things.

in time it will be helpful to see the biochar route represented, as
well as a combined energy through gasification with partial biochar
take off.  straight gasification will of course have the same curve as
the assumed perfect combustion to co2 and h2o in the biomass energy
energy line.

the pointer to this paper comes from bernie at green waste recycle
yard.  the paper is from the pacific institute.

j



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jim mason
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current project: mechabolic (http://www.mechabolic.org)
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