[Terrapreta] Your input needed: "Soil health" at Roundtable on Sustainable Biofuels

[Kevin Chisholm]

Dear Lou

lou gold wrote:
>
>
> Thanks Kevin for your elaboration. It's good to discuss this with 
> you.I find that upon deeper consideration that we both agree and 
> disagree or, less presumingly, let me say that I both agree and 
> disagree with you.We surely agree that politics and government can 
> make terrible mistakes and cause major distortions. Subsidies for corn 
> ethanol are a case-in-point.

It is good that we review our differences. Sometimes, people other than 
ourselves have the answers. ;-)

>
> But we disagree about thinking that some invisible hand of free market 
> economics can solve the problem. There is no free market out there to 
> make your test of letting everything "rise and fall on its own." The 
> present form of modern agriculture is ALREADY subsidized (in the 
> industrial world) at the level of one billion dollars a day. YES, of 
> course, this has produced distortions -- massive ones -- and the 
> playing field has been so warped that the free competition that you 
> might like is not possible without the countervailing force of 
> government intervention.

Actually, I think we are in agreement on the unworkability, unfairness 
and probable non-existance of the "invisible hand" as Adam Smith 
intended the concept. I think what we do have is indeed an "invisible 
hand",  that functions  in a manner to benefit  the few, at teh expense 
of teh many.
>
> But beyond the economic and political analytics lies something more 
> fundamental. The things that you want to see as separate (in good 
> reductionist manner) are in reality connected. Here is a single 
> example: you want to separate waste management and soil restoration? 
> The dead zone of the Gulf of Mexico is the result of fertilizer 
> run-offs from Midwest agriculture. If something can help the soil 
> retain the fertilizer (perhaps biochar) waste management and soil 
> restoration become the same thing. The healing lies in the connection!

OK... If I am the Farmer that buys the char for my farm, I will not buy 
the charcoal unless it pays for itself. If it is cheaper for me to 
mwaste a bit of fertilizer, tehn thats what I will do. I find I can make 
more money if I externalize my costs, just like the Big Guys do. :-)
>
> I'm afraid Kevin that when I say "we must tie things together" that 
> you always imagine some "demon gummint" but I am talking about the 
> healing that comes from tying things together in a mind that is 
> reaching beyond the old separations.

How come it is always us Little Guys that have to do "the right thing?" 
As the song says...
"Its the Rich that gets the pleasure
Its the Poor that gets the Pain
Its the same the whole world over.
Isn't that a bleeding shame?"
>
> When and if we can see things more as wholes and less in separation 
> both government and politicians will become more like important 
> co-creators helping to guide our collective ship of state. I 
> understand that we have a long way to go and I also understand the 
> direction that I think best. All I ask from others who disagree is 
> that they think about it.

Leave room for us little fellas to do what works. Don't encumber us with 
tied obligations that can lead to the Baby being flushed with the Bathwater.

Best wishes,

Kevin
>
> hugs, thanks and blessings,
>
> lou
>
>
>
> On Mon, May 12, 2008 at 2:06 AM, Kevin Chisholm 
> <kchisholm at ca.inter.net <mailto:kchisholm at ca.inter.net>> wrote:
>
>     Dear Lou
>
>     lou gold wrote:
>
>         Hi Kevin,
>
>         Don't you think we agree on the need to tie the four together?
>
>
>     That is where I think we disagree. I think that we specifically
>     SHOULD NOT tie them together. Let them each rise or fall on their
>     own merits.
>
>
>         If they are separated (as you point out) there will be no biochar.
>
>
>     Waste biomass, on pyrolysis, can yield biomass char. This biochar
>     has (at least) two uses... charcoal as fuel, charcoal as a soil
>     amendment. What happens if I can sell charcoal for fuel (or other
>     uses) at $300 per tonne, and if a Farmer can only afford to pay me
>     $50 per tonne for biochar to add to soil? Are we to stop selling
>     biochar to energy (or other) applications because the Farmer will
>     not pay more than $50 per tonne? The purpose of this List is to
>     find ways to promote char additions to the soil, if it is sensible
>     to do so, NOT to attempt to regulate the biochar industry.
>
>         That's why I said they needed to be tied together. I didn't
>         mean to imply they they were (automatically) tied together.
>
>
>     And that is why I feel they specifically SHOULD NOT be tied
>     together. We (at least I) don't know what a Farmer can afford to
>     pay for biochar to add to the soil. Perhaps "New Terra Preta" is
>     uneconomic. If it was uneconomic, then tying the development of a
>     biochar industry to additions to soil would kill it dead.
>
>     Perhaps they might work out wonderfully well together. For
>     example, sell big pieces of charcoal to the heating market, and
>     sell the fines into the soil amendment market. I do not know how
>     things will want to "shake out", and accordingly, I think it would
>     be a bad thing to "tie them together".
>
>     If you want to encourage the use of biochar for soil amendment
>     purposes, then work on getting a subsidy to encourage the use of
>     biochar for soil additions. Imagine how people would be racing to
>     their retorts if the Gummint was giving a subsidy equivalent to
>     the subsidy now being given to support ethanol!
>
>     Best wishes,
>
>     Kevin
>