[Terrapreta] char & vascular systems

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Hi Roy,

 

>From what I've been able to determine, most of the biological activity
associated with  biochar is associated with mesopores-including structural
fractures or other irregularities, or the exposed outer surfaces of
granules. Phenomena such as cation exchange enhancement is a 2-D, surface
reaction; the surfaces can be the outer surface of a char granule as well as
the inner surfaces of a micropores with nanometer-scale radii. 

 

At higher production temperatures, carbon acts more like a metal; different
processing conditions yield different physical conformations, some quite
elegant. At low production temperatures, the primary accomplishment is the
distillation of volatiles and the reduction of saccharides to their
elemental carbon constituents. When this happens-particularly when the
feedstock is dry enough to avoid rapid shrinking and the fracturing stresses
that this induces-the char physically resembles the original substrate.
There are, for instance, striking differences between bamboo char and char
from oak. The surface area of the oak char is likely more accessible than
that of the bamboo on a macro scale but if each material were micronized to
the same mesh size, I believe that surface areas would become more
equivalent and surface-dependent operations such as adsorption and CEC
enhancement may be normalized.

 

If the utility of biochar requires a xylem-rich original structure to
provide demonstrable benefits, then this does not bode well for the
conversion of such things as MSW, which at least some investigators believe
makes perfectly adequate biochar.

 

Mark

 

From: terrapreta-bounces at bioenergylists.org
[mailto:terrapreta-bounces at bioenergylists.org] On Behalf Of Roy Lent
Sent: Saturday, June 07, 2008 10:24 AM
To: terrapreta at bioenergylists.org
Subject: [Terrapreta] char & vascular systems

 

When I asked about lignite as TP I was told that lignite does not work since
it contains no real vascular system. At least one list member was of this
opinion. Now I see the discussion on the list about making TP char from
algae, May I point out that no algae has a vascular system. Is there
something I'm missing here?

Roy

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