[Terrapreta] Where do you get it?

[Ron Larson]

Kurt and list members.  Reply notes below in bold.

----- Original Message ----- 
From: "Kurt Treutlein" <rukurt at westnet.com.au>
To: "Terra Preta" <terrapreta at bioenergylists.org>
Sent: Thursday, June 05, 2008 5:35 AM
Subject: [Terrapreta] Where do you get it?


> I've raised this question before, and so have others. If we consider the 
> large scale production of charcoal, to be used for TP, where is the 
> biomass feedstock to come from?
> 
> The simplistic answer is "No worries mate, there's plenty of it going 
> into landfill and being wasted". And so there is, but I suggest that it 
> isn't enough for a really large scale effort.  [RWL:  Agreed - landfill is clearly not enough.  But it would be poor strategy to ignore it.]
> 
> Past societies have denuded their forests producing charcoal for 
> smelting purposes, all the way back to the bronze age, not to mention 
> more recent iron smelting in the USA. Today, the humble cooking fire in 
> many parts of Africa and India is leading to wholesale deforestation, as 
> people endeavor to fill the need for cooking fuel.  [RWL:  Agreed - much biomass harvesting has been poorly done.  Some has been done well, however.  The ancient Brits had laws, operating well for centuries, that charcoal could only be produced from coppiced trees.  I know one entreprenuerial enterprise in Sri Lanka fueling a steam power plant with big cost savings over oil - using coppicing practices.  The US has had many DoE studies on energy plantations (coppicing/pollarding always) which they believe can be sustainable - and will obviously be more so with biochar.  To the best of my knowledge, those energy plantation studies (mostly out of Oak Ridge) never have looked at biochar.]
> 
> Use crop residues! Sure, but then what goes into the soil to replace the 
> Soil Organic Material, that the wee beasties in our charcoal, need to eat.  [RWL:  There may have to be some organic additions.  However, Dr. A.D. Karve, I think on this list, has reported that many rural Indian farmers get by with zero commercial fertilizers by regular feedings of the bacteria/fungus with powdered, dried leaves.  I believe that many crop harvests necessarily, for economic reasons, have to leave a big part of the root system - and that may be enough remaining organic carbon for some crops.   My reading of the experience in modern Amazonian terrapreta agriculture is that they are harvesting perennially without any added fertilizers or added organics.  Many crops worldwide have the crop residues burnt in the field (insect control).  Other areas use slash and burn - when slash and char would seem to be much wiser.   I strongly believe that crop residues will be a big part of biochar's future.  But we agree that it is not the whole solution. ]
> 
> The increased productivity of the soil will give us more crop residues 
> and this will provide the feedstock!. Somehow that doesn't seem likely
> either.  [RWL:  Won't be the whole story - agreed.  But what is your preferred alternative approach?  We ceretainly will see ag land shared with solar/wind options, but we need the biochar to be produced in part as part of a storage (of biomass) and biochar complex, with productive use of the pyrolysis gases, as back-up for the solar/wind.]
> 
> Start managing forestry to give a sustainable output of feedstock? That 
> might help, especially with coppicing. "Really selectively" log. Another 
> possibility. At present a lot of forests are suffering from fatal 
> attacks, pine bark beetle for one, fire killed forest areas for another. 
> Building logging roads into them is considered too destructive and I 
> agree. New extraction methods are needed. A while back someone married 
> secondhand helicopters with an airship. It failed, but that sort of 
> thing might just do it. Use the slash from legitimate agricultural land 
> clearing. I see a lot of that around here and it just gets burnt, or rots.  [RWL:  Good - we seem to agree. Managed "wild" forests looks like about half the biochar feedstock solution to me.  I do not put energy plantations of willow, aspen, pines,etc into this category - which obviously have to be managed for maximum sustainable yield.    Same with switchgrass and similar perennial crops - which also can be done either well or not so well, from a sustainability perspective.  I have faith we can learn to do it well.  And what is the alternative?]
> 
> Algae. I've mentioned that before and won't bore with it again.   [RWL:  Need research on its efficacy.  I worry about the lack of internal algae structure and surface area - but agree that it has promise (because of algae's high solar conversion efficiency and our need for liquid fuels.]
> 
> Just some thoughts.  [RWL:  In summary, I like the optimism of your last part - and hope you will consider further on the pessimism of your first part.   We badly need concurrence on how much biochar can contribute to the twin problems of global warming and world-wide failing soils.    To say we can't do it , and do it cost-effectively, is way too premature.   Ron]
> 
> Kurt
> 
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