[Terrapreta] biochar from stoker boiler

[Ron Larson]

Alex:

    Welcome to the terrapreta list.  Your first news item is very welcome.

    You must explain more on what you have been doing.   What is the 
production rate?  What are you paying for switchgrass? Are you ready to sell 
a product?  What biochar cost looks appropriate  (say in a 20-25 kilo bag)? 
How fine is the chopping?  Is that a costly operation?  etc.

Other Terra Preta list members:

    1.  Alex is a very knowlegeable pyrolysis expert.  Go back 10 years on 
the stoves list and you will see many excellent theoretical and experimental 
discussions from Alex.  He knows a lot about the greenhouse business and 
heating greenhouses cheaply.

    2.  I am pretty sure he has modified an existing boiler so that the 
chain grate stoker is run faster and char comes off the end, rather than 
ash.   With many such stokers around the world, Alex can perhaps help 
"solve" the charcoal storage pretty quickly.  This assumes that other stoker 
owners can learn about a market that will justify the stoker modifications 
that I hope Alex will tell us about.

    3.  The beauty of this approach is that there has to be clean combustion 
and there is a guaranteed use for the "waste" pyrolysis gases.   I see no 
reason that many/every coal- fired power plants can't retrofit quickly - as 
they already understand chaingrate stokers.

Ron




----- Original Message ----- 
From: "Alex and Christine English" <english at kingston.net>
To: <terrapreta at bioenergylists.org>
Sent: Saturday, June 07, 2008 6:15 PM
Subject: [Terrapreta] biochar from stoker boiler


> Dear Char people,
>
> We ran a test burn of some finely chopped switchgrass in our boiler 
> recently. It was
> spring harvested and showed only a  little tendency toward ash fussion. 
> Partly
> because it also tended to form char and not burn out to ash. It seems to 
> be self
> quenching. A real natural for biochar.
>
> Alex English
> Canada
>
>
>
>
>
> _______________________________________________
> Terrapreta mailing list
> Terrapreta at bioenergylists.org
> http://tech.groups.yahoo.com/group/biochar/
> http://terrapreta.bioenergylists.org
> http://info.bioenergylists.org