[Terrapreta] ammonia and charcoal

[Gerald Van Koeverden]

>> Could chemical interactions between ammonia and charcoal be the  
>> initial key for how charcoal is gradually transformed into that  
>> found in terra preta?

"Australian researchers have discovered a cheap and simple way to  
make sheets of carbon just one atom thick.
Their finding has implications for a range of developments from solar  
cells to bionic ears.
The sheets, known as graphene, normally stack together to make the  
kind of graphite used in pencils.
But when separated, graphene sheets have extraordinary electronic,  
thermal and mechanical characteristics, says Gordon Wallace from the  
University of Wollongong in New South Whales, Australia.
"People have known that if you can separate sheets of graphene from  
graphite you can get some pretty interesting properties," he explained.
Most researchers thought creating these sheets in a cost-effective  
way was an insurmountable challenge, due to their strong tendency to  
clump together. But in the journal Nature Nanotechnology this week,  
Wallace's team shows stopping the sheets from aggregating is actually  
a fairly simple matter.
The Australian team did not use chemical stabilizers to keep the  
sheet apart. Instead, they used water with some ammonia added to  
increase its pH value, making it more alkaline.
"It's actually a really simple discovery but with fairly significant  
implications," Wallace said.
"It's a matter of understanding that simple chemistries can be  
applied to graphite sheets."
Increasing the pH of the water raises the electrostatic charge on the  
graphene sheets, he explained, making sure they repel one another  
instead of clumping together.
This low cost approach raises the possibility that scientists could  
produce large amounts of stable graphene that could be used in a  
range of settings.
"The very unusual electronic properties of graphene sheets means they  
could be used in solar cells or new battery technology," he said.  
"Because of the biological affinity of carbon, they might also be  
useful as electrodes for a range of medical bionic devices such as  
cochlear implants."


>> http://dsc.discovery.com/news/2008/01/29/nanotech-carbon.html


Ammonia and water - being the main ingredients in urine - could  
easily have been added to charcoal by native Amazonians.

It is apparent that ammonia changes the chemical nature of carbon  
molecules.  To effect charcoal, it would need transform only the  
innner pore surface area of the charcoal particle to dramatically  
change its CEC, without affecting its overall physical structure.

This afternoon, I added a saturated solution of ammonium nitrate to  
biochar to compare with a control of pure water mix.  Once I let it  
sit for several days, I'll dry out the samples and then see if I can  
see any difference in how they re-mix with water.

Unfortunately, I don't have any lab equipment to then test to see if  
the CEC has changed.  I'm trying to think of simple tests I could do  
to find out what, if any, properties have changed, for example:

a)  putting a large drop of water adjacent to the pile of char to see  
how quickly the char sucks it up as a test to see whether its  
hydrophobic properties have changed.

b)  using the two samples as a filter for various aqueous solutions  
to see if there is any difference in what they filter out of them...

c)  any ideas?

Gerrit


On 7-Feb-08, at 2:13 PM, Nikolaus Foidl wrote:

> Dear Gerrit!
>
> Taking samples from the " ash stripes" the charcoal content in the  
> first 30
> cm depth is way over 150 tons / ha. I will do a cross sectional  
> productivity
> control to see if productivity( height of plants and grain yield) is
> changing according to the charcoal and non charcoal parts.
> Best regards Nikolaus
> P.S. I did some trials to get crystallized Nitrogen adding Formalin  
> to human
> and animal urine and it worked very well. No I am doing trials  
> adding these
> nitrogen-formalin crystals to crops.
>
>
> On 2/7/08 12:53 PM, "Gerald Van Koeverden" <vnkvrdn at yahoo.ca> wrote:
>
>> Nikolaus,
>>
>> It might be more correct to re-name those green "charcoal stripes" as
>> "ash stripes."  The healthy growth probably doesn't have anything to
>> do with charcoal.  It is most likely the result of the
>> remineralization of the soil from the wood ashes. I've seen the same
>> occur here in Canada.  When you have a burn pile from bush clearing,
>> the plants growing there are usually much more productive for the
>> next three or four years.
>>
>> Of course, there is some charcoal produced in those bush windrows
>> too.  But I suspect it is only a very small fraction of the initial
>> biomass.  Either we can't see its long-term effect from the airplane,
>> or since charcoal is initially an inert hydrophilic medium, it still
>> hasn't been able to develop into a suitable microhabitat for soil
>> organisms.
>>
>> Is it possible that charcoal mixed with human waste like urine would
>> transform it into something much more effective in promoting  
>> fertility??
>>
>> It is only in the last year that scientists discovered that
>> substances like urine - a combination of ammonia and water - have a
>> very powerful chemical effect on changing the chemical properties of
>> carbon.
>>
>> http://dsc.discovery.com/news/2008/01/29/nanotech-carbon.html
>>
>>
>> Gerrit
>>
>> On 7-Feb-08, at 8:02 AM, Nikolaus Foidl wrote:
>>
>>> Dear All!
>>>
>>> In those photos you can see 3 to 5 year old charcoal stripes left
>>> over from
>>> the forest burnings, in some fotos as dark green stripes and in
>>> some as
>>> white stripes where nothing is growing. The growth in the beginning
>>> depends
>>> on the type of grass you are planting, some cannot grow with this
>>> high level
>>> of potassium others love this high level of potassium and thrive
>>> extraordinarily well on it. In the next set of photos you see as
>>> well a
>>> actual forest being chained down, after chaining down the wood is
>>> lined up
>>> with caterpillars into 4 parallel rows partially covered with loose
>>> soil and
>>> then burned up in 24 hours. The piles of wood get up to 10 meters
>>> high and
>>> the pile on the base is some 12 to 15 meters wide and as long as
>>> the fields
>>> are. Afterwards with a plow with 60" diameter disks the whole  
>>> field is
>>> turned over to get the remaining roots out. Those are burned as
>>> well in the
>>> same rows where the stems where burned or charred.
>>>
>>> One photo shows the fields after 15 years and there is no visible
>>> evidence
>>> anymore of the existence of those high volume charcoal stripes all
>>> though
>>> the charcoal is still in the soil. So the "growth enhancing  
>>> effect" is
>>> fading away. The only thing I could try from the plain is to use a
>>> spectral
>>> reflectance camera to see if different nutrient uptake gives us an
>>> image in
>>> spectral reflectance.
>>> Best regards Nikolaus
>>>
>>> <P1130556.jpg><DSC00975.jpg><DSC00982.jpg><DSC00987.jpg><P1130553.jp 
>>> g>
>>
>
>

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