[Terrapreta] Use Terra Preta soil formation as a means to combat Global Warming and Global Climate Change

[lou gold]

Hey Sean,

That's a wonderful exposition.

I have no idea as to the big answers but I feel grateful to receive your
thorough thoughts which seem marvelously well-balanced between hope and
realism.

hugs,

lou

On Sat, Mar 15, 2008 at 1:27 AM, Sean K. Barry <sean.barry at juno.com> wrote:

>  Hi Jim,
>
> My thinking on Terra Preta is that it can work in the long run for
> agricultural purposes.  It looks like quite a complex mixture, and soil
> building process too, involving - charcoal-in-soil, soil organic matter,
> soil microorganisms, plants, water content, nutrient concentration, maybe
> vermiculture, and even pottery shards.  It happens over a long time.
>
> One of the evident ingredients in still existing TP sites his high carbon
> content in the soil, specifically charcoal.  In the early 21st century
> charcoal-in-soil had another possible use, a use possibly more cast than the
> agricultural use for now, maybe.  Charcoal-in-soil is long term carbon
> sequestration, with estimated life in the soil measured in millennia.
>
> This topic comes up in here - "Use Terra Preta soil formation as a means
> to combat Global Warming and Global Climate Change".
> Then the nay-saying peopl answer.  "Well, that's if you believe that
> humans even caused GW or that we could do anything about it anyway.  Well,
> that's if Terra Preta can even last that long in the soil.  Well, that can't
> work because that is too much charcoal to have to make and pay for.  The
> economics aren't there.  Well, charcoal is fuel and people will use it for
> fuel before they will ever put it into the ground.  No one will do it unless
> they can get an immediate agricultural benefit to their soil for putting
> charcoal into it.  Charcoal has volatile matter which has cancer causing
> pytotoxins in it.  That is just pie in the sky high tech toys that will
> never pay for themselves or make charcoal from biomass economically."
>
> I seen and been in a lot of these discussions and heard lots of arguments
> against trying anything.  The results of this exercise are impressive,
> right, aren't they?  I believe now is the time for ACTION.  I've studied the
> theory of the anthropogenic cause for current GW and GCC.  I am an adherent
> to it.  I also, therefore, think humans can have an effect on world
> climate.  This is enough for me to believe that human ACTION can reduce this
> problem of rising GHG concentrations and/or reduce its effects (GW and GCC)
> for people now and in our following generations.
>
> From human actions alone, we have directly caused the atmospheric CO2
> concentration to rise from ~250-280 ppm steadily and increasingly up to 383
> ppm in 150 years.  We will drive it past ~450 ppm with business as usual.
> We are now, have been for some time, and will be in the future affecting the
> atmosphere and the climate by doing this emissions of GHGs like CO2, and CH4
> , and N2O into the atmosphere.
>
> But, we have the power to change all this, too, I think.  We can effect
> the atmosphere differently.  We can mitigate this problem of rising GHG
> concentrations.  We can remove CO2 directly and semi-permanently from the
> atmosphere by charring biomass and burying it into soil.  It may or may not
> look and act like the agricultural miracle of Terra Preta within our or our
> children's lifetimes.  That will, I'm sure, take some learning and nurturing
> for us to to do that.  But, putting charcoal-into-soil now will remove
> carbon from the atmosphere, now.
>
> With an active program like the Kyoto Protocol working, and with all
> parties signed on (US , Australia, and China signed on as an Annex I
> country),  then where CDM projects are running in developing countries,
> "carbon credits" can accrue and carbon sequestration can be fully funded.
> Rather than tax Americans, I think the US government should give a tax
> deduction for money invested in third world "carbon credits".  I don't
> believe in a "carbon tax", either.  But, I think we should all wipe our own
> asses, too.
>
> To me there is a workable plan to actually do something that will actually
> reduce the problem at its root.  Atmospheric CO2 concentrations are already
> too high, reducing further emissions is a lame answer to that.  Look at
> Jevons's Paradox and see that energy conservation won't work either.  It is
> just a game of the marketers to promote expanding sales volume at low
> prices.  The only real way to do anything to reduce atmospheric
> concentrations of GHG is to directly remove CO2 and reduce emissions of GHG,
> specifically from burning of fossil fuels and using fossil fuel derived
> fertilizers, pesticides, and herbicides.
>
> We should conserve only on the use of all renewable (non-fossil) energy
> sources.  Let the fossil fuel mining, drilling, and refining companies
> exhaust there cheap energy quickly and be stuck trying to sell an inferior
> product (a fossil carbon intense energy resource) at higher prices.
> Then enact a tax on fossil carbon rich fuels.  Make only those who would
> afford themselves fossil fuels pay that tax then.
>
> Biomass conversion to charcoal also has an answer to the looming energy
> crisis.  Conversion of biomass to charcoal for use in charcoal-in-soil
> carbon sequestration can, at the same time, liberate a significant amount of
> heat energy and chemical energy in the form of medium to low BTU gases as
> products from the conversion process.  So, usable energy can be harvested
> from biomass at the same time as some of the biomass could be left
> (un-harvested) as charcoal.
>
> Good night true advocates of Terra Preta and to others.
>
> Regards,
>
> SKB
>
>
>
>
>
>
> Regards,
>
> SKB
>
>
> ----- Original Message -----
> *From:* Jim Joyner <jimstoy at dtccom.net>
> *To:* terrapreta at bioenergylists.org
> *Sent:* Tuesday, March 11, 2008 9:59 AM
> *Subject:* Re: [Terrapreta] What is so bad about global warming?
>
> I understand that terra preta is something of a focal point for a
> discussion about many somewhat related things. But are we not getting a
> little ahead of ourselves?
>
> First, we don't even know for certain that we can create terra preta,
> i.e., sequester carbon in the soil in some sort of very long term
> beneficiality.
>
> Second, and maybe more important, we don't know, even if we can create
> terra preta or something near it, that it can be done economically.
>
> Isn't it just a little early to be talking about the use of TP saving
> the human species from itself? Isn't all this talk of stopping global
> warming with TP just a kind wishful thinking, mental masterbation?
>
> Seems to be we should be working on these two items. IF the answers work
> out well, GW can take care of itself one way or the other.
>
> Jim
>
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-- 
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