[Terrapreta] Farm/compost biochar

[Dick Gallien]

Thanks for offering suggestions Max.  Ten days after dozing  a few ft. of
wet biomass over a large blazing brush pile, it is still smoldering. I won't
do that again, so I'm leaning on you out there, to KISS this little tank.
Ask any questions. I'll have my attorney disclose my financial status to
Kevin, but after 2 ex's, 8 kids, over 40 crummy jobs and living it up on a
little SS check, it won't be a long read.

Bought this 175 acre farm 52 yrs. ago, with a wife and 2 kids, while
attending the local college on the GI Bill from the Korean Peace Action.
The evidence that development is the most lucrative crop for farmers,
surrounds every city.  Instead of  taking 2 million from a developer, I
received $265,000 for a Scenic Easement Grant, by protecting it from
development with a Conservation Easement through the DNR and Mn;. Land
Trust. No sane person, in a society where money is god to most, would have a
compost site 50' from their home, with strangers driving in every day, from
dawn until dark, for 16 years and also recycle tons of food waste, when some
rich sob would gladly pay 1 million plus to have this topographically
diverse piece of land, on which a mile of 2 trout streams join, only 3.5
miles from Winona (pop. 26,000), but protected from town by 600' hills , for
his locked gate show off estate. I'm working on a way to give the farm to a
group that will continue demonstrating by example, the best ways to make use
of organic materials that most cities look on as something to burn, bury or
flush.
Thanks, Dick

http://community.webshots.com/album/563661895nUjqlO

On Sun, Jun 1, 2008 at 3:43 AM, MFH <mfh01 at bigpond.net.au> wrote:

>  Dick, I'd love to make some suggestions but can't quite get a mental
> picture of the tank car and the fuel tank but it sounds like you have a
> serious potential retort.
>
>
>
> Any chance of a rough sketch (even in MS Word with the rudimentary drawing
> tools)?
>
>
>
> Max H
>  ------------------------------
>
> *From:* terrapreta-bounces at bioenergylists.org [mailto:
> terrapreta-bounces at bioenergylists.org] *On Behalf Of *Dick Gallien
> *Sent:* Sunday, 1 June 2008 1:31 PM
> *To:* terra pretta group
> *Subject:* [Terrapreta] Farm/compost biochar
>
>
>
> Still looking for suggestions.  Kevin suggested I use this tank to char the
> huge piles of brush, which I have refused to torch, as many compost? sites
> do here.   It is a 30' X 10' dia. 1" thick, over 36,000 lbs. rail road tank
> car, which I can top load with the old log truck.  A 11' dia. fuel tank is
> hanging from the top of the rr tank, so the 6" can be filled with insulation
> (any suggestions as to the cheapest, most effective high temp insulation?).
> The lid would be air tight, I can make a 4' X 4' door at the base, so as to
> unload with an extended bucket on the Bobcat and planned to funnel from
> about 6' above the base, down to 4' dia.at the base.  How would you run
> this as a retort? I could have a removable stove as the 4' X 4' door, but I
> don't understand how the stove is exhausted and how the wood gas is returned
> to combust in the stove.  At 76, I'm eager to get started, before the party
> is over.  Kevin asked,  Why do you REALLY want to do this and I can only say
> it would be for the inner satisfaction of seeing it work, making good use of
> this usually wasted tree waste, giving others ideas and improving the soil
> on this little farm. Please forward this to anyone else that might be
> interested. Hope to hear from you.  Dick
>
> On Sat, May 31, 2008 at 10:54 AM, Dick Gallien <dickgallien at gmail.com>
> wrote:
>
> Am looking for suggestion. I've had a community service farm compost site,
> open every day, from dawn until dark, for 16 years, operating on an honor
> system. Three times I've hired a 650 hp tub grinder, the last time was 7
> years ago, costing over $10,000 and there is no market for the grindings. So
> I have 7 years of accumulated brush, trees and stumps.  Over 90% of tree
> waste in Mn. is torched and I joke that torching is against my religion.
> Biochar and terra preta allows me to bend, but not break my religion. I'm
> looking for the simplest way to char large quantities of brush and larger
> wood, to use on this farm, as a demonstration, to keep from being buried in
> it and because I have a hangup about rich, living soil.
>
> Must immediately reduce the volume of brush, so
> a few days ago I dozed old brush against a 15' high bank of wet, packed
> biomass. When it was blazing I dozed (Kamotso, with 11' blade--little bigger
> than a D-6) the pile from above, completely burying it, except for a few
> wisps of  smoke still coming from the pile, 5 days later.
>
> Obviously not the answer.  Can stack brush 8' high with the jawed backhoe
> or much higher with an old log truck.
> Leave a pole in the center as a chimney, to be pulled later.
> Cover the pile a few ft. deep with wet biomass and light it down in the
> pole hole.  Would appreciate any suggestions
> from your readings or experience.
>
> Once the huge piles of brush are cleaned up am wondering about something
> like the Adam retort, except much larger.  My Trojan loader bucket is 8'
> wide, so could make a rectangular trench into a bank 10' to 12' wide, for
> loading and unloading into the 425 bu. spreader.  I can get 2'X2'X6', tongue
> and groove concrete bunker blocks delivered for $35 at .  Don't know how they
> would hold up to the heat.  I use them double stacked to hold hogs in, which
> I raise totally on food waste.  Same question for pre-cast concrete, self
> supporting bunker silo walls. I can put either one into a bank, 8 or 10'
> high, with dirt flush to the top, so the sides would be airtight.  Have the
> end of a 42' wide building, made into a bank, the bank retained by 16' high
> precaste bunker silo walls,--- but what to cover a larger Adams retort
> with--, some crude, top loading, movable wood burner as part of an end
> wall???
>
> Thanks for listening,  Dick
>
> --
> Dick Gallien
> 22501 East Burns Valley Road
> Winona MN 55987
> dickgallien at gmail.com [507]454-3126
> www.thewinonafarm.com
>
>
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>
>
>
> --
> Dick Gallien
> 22501 East Burns Valley Road
> Winona MN 55987
> dickgallien at gmail.com [507]454-3126
> www.thewinonafarm.com
>



-- 
Dick Gallien
22501 East Burns Valley Road
Winona MN 55987
dickgallien at gmail.com [507]454-3126
www.thewinonafarm.com
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