[Terrapreta] Max Planck Institute: Making Coal

[Brian Hans]

If a system is closed, what goes in - comes out. If conditions are not enough to react (oxydize) the oils, they remain, some in the 'soup' and some in the 'Char'. Infact, there is some overall reducing going on so the % of reduced chem's is much higher than parent materal, which is the wrong way to go for TP and soil improvement. Its akin to throwing oily rags into the soil. 
   
  The reason you dont hear about HTC commercially is because one can buy coal for 40$/ton and/or burn biomass straight. HTC is somewhere inbetween, in an economic limbo. 
   
  To answer your questions...
   
  - No. 
   
  -Good luck. You would need a refinery step... which is likely way over budget. 
   
  -Only at the largest of scales. 
   
  20Bar vessel is an expensive, high tech piece of equipment. Someone trained needs to run it or it becomes a bomb. Infact a reactor that doesnt mix is commonly refered to as a 'bomb'. 
   
  Brian Hans
   
  
Green Waste Recycle Yard <info at GreenWasteRecycleYard.com> wrote:
      Thank you for the comment Brian. Ever since I heard about HTC out of Max Planck, I've been listening on the Internet for news on real world applications of the concept; not a peep. I was curious about the end products, which had been reported to be char and water. Interesting to hear that the char still contains the VOCs and oils.
   
  Do you know of any public documentatin of end product analysis for HTC?
   
  Are there ways to take the char product and separate the VOC's after HTC?
   
  Effective ways of capturing the exothermic energy created in the process?
   
      Bernie Lenhoff
  Business Manager
  Green Waste Recycle Yard



    
---------------------------------
  From: terrapreta-bounces at bioenergylists.org [mailto:terrapreta-bounces at bioenergylists.org] On Behalf Of Brian Hans
Sent: Tuesday, January 15, 2008 12:21 PM
To: Bernie Lenhoff
Subject: Re: [Terrapreta] Max Planck Institute: Making Coal


  
  EarthMimic has been doing HTC for over a year. 
   
  For now, we stopped doing HTC to TP research because the expense of the equipment vs existing marketplace. There are also alot of VOC's and oils within the char material which we found made for bad root growth conditions. 
   
  There is a very big diff between pyrolysis (burns off the oils and lignin's) and reducing biomass with steam and pressure. And 20bar's of pressure is nothing to sneeze at, so be careful. 
   
  Brian Hans

PurNrg at aol.com wrote:
  
In a message dated 1/15/08 10:34:18 AM, aballiett at frontiernet.net writes:


  Markus Antonietti from the Max-Planck Institute has developed a
simple but ingenious way of producing coal using biomass - such as
waste from the garden or leaves from the local forest.


OMG! This is amazing and exciting and could really change things if it gets the support it needs! Thanks for the great link.

Peter :-)>
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