Comments on: Biochar: Make It or Buy It?

By: jonah levine

jonah levine — Sun, 18 Jul 2010 18:23:12 +0000

You can get biochar from Biochar Engineering Corp., based in Golden, Colorado. You can find us online at:www.biocharengineering.com

Thanks,

Jonah

By: Ginger

Ginger — Fri, 19 Jun 2009 00:54:53 +0000

Hi Jeff! Occasionally last winter I needed to give the kids an opportunity to do something dangerous and productive. After reading about biochar in Mother Earth, I let them gather prunings and blown down branches and then burn them in some of our garden beds. Seemed like a win-win. We’ll see what the longterm results yield. I think I understood the method to involve letting the burnt mass smoulder, not burn out. We are just trying to figure it out as we go along.

By: Jeff

Jeff — Wed, 17 Jun 2009 21:36:53 +0000

Hi Mark,

Those are some really interesting links! I’ll have to look at them in more detail when I have some time. Yes, you had told me about the Open Source tractor before, but I wasn’t aware of these links – there is just so much information out there and only 24 hours in the day! That’s why it is so nice to have multiple minds and eyes out there sorting through all of the information for information worth pursuing! Thanks for the contribution!

By: Jeff

Jeff — Wed, 17 Jun 2009 21:32:53 +0000

Biochar is really just a new word for charcoal. I surmise that because charcoal has coal in it (I wasn’t aware of that until I did the research for the post) that the new word was invented to reflect that biochar is what is also called “lump charcoal” and that it is used not for smelting iron or heating or cooking but as a soil amendment. Thus “bio” + “char”. When biomass is burned in the open air, most of it is reduced to ash, which obviously is not the same as char. While ash is a good fertilizer, it is not the same as biochar. When I have the time, I’ll create another post that goes into what to do with the biochar once it is in hand.

By: Mark Thomas

Mark Thomas — Wed, 17 Jun 2009 18:31:54 +0000

Hi Jeff,

Have I told you about the Factor E Farm project before? These folks are developing an open-source farm–all of the tools necessary to build a resilient community free online to be used and modified. They already have plans for a tractor and compressed earth block maker and are working on sawmills, solar generators, and biofuel systems. I follow their blog regularly at http://openfarmtech.org/weblog

Here is their wiki entry on biochar: http://openfarmtech.org/index.php?title=Biochar. I’m going to add a link to this page to it to get your info and the VA Tech and other links from the comments.

By: chris

chris — Wed, 17 Jun 2009 13:04:34 +0000

Gardeners and farmers sometimes burn over areas for planting. Is this creating bio-char? I burned a big brush pile on my garden last winter. I’d cut down some little wild cherry trees that were threatening to shade the veg. It felt wasteful to send all that energy into the air. The potatoes growing over that area are the biggest. Most of the biomass around here goes to compost or the wood stove. Interesting topic, thanks.

By: Jeff

Jeff — Sun, 14 Jun 2009 18:14:07 +0000

Hi Beth,

Biochar is just a fancy name for charcoal buried in the soil. I’m sure that, over time, you could accumulate charcoal from celebratory bonfires in your neighborhood, crush it, and add it to a portion of your garden. It would be interesting if you just applied it to one small area to see for yourself if it made any difference. I’ve read that if you soak the charcoal in compost tea it makes it more effective – there are micro-organisms in the compost tea that take up residence in the pores of the charcoal.

By: Beth

Beth — Sun, 14 Jun 2009 17:39:14 +0000

I had never heard of biochar, Jeff, but find this very interesting. Thanks for posting all this information. I look forward to the time it is made affordable for the average home gardener. Until then, I guess I’ll enjoy my compost. It’s free!

By: Erich J. Knight

Erich J. Knight — Sun, 14 Jun 2009 17:22:50 +0000

Dr. Agblevor at VT has his mobile pyrolyser running at a poultry farm in Dayton, VA.

All the poultry litter biochar he is making is going to VT for agronomic research.
Dr. Roy Maguire is doing this field research.

There is real magic coming out of the Asian biochar conference.
15 ears per stalk of corn with a 250% yield increase,
Sacred trees and chickens raised from near death
Multiple confirmations of 80% – 90% reduction of soil GHG (Green House Gas) emissions.

The abstracts of the conference are at
http://www.anzbiochar.org/2009presentations.html

Cheers,
Erich

By: Jeff

Jeff — Sat, 13 Jun 2009 17:30:37 +0000

Very interesting, Erich! I had read previously of the efforts of researchers at Virginia Tech in this field but it seemed to be a well-concealed secret – it was hard to find out more information. For instance, I read of the development of a mobile pyrolysis machine but could find few details. I wonder, given that there are quite a large number of people who would be interested in biochar who live within a 50 mile radius of Blacksburg, why more people are not aware of this research? Or is it just me, since I do not live in Virginia? Maybe I’m the proverbial “rock behind the door”?

I checked out CharGrow on the web site you provided and there isn’t much information about it, except to say that it is biochar with a microbial inoculant. No price – just a contact form. Maybe my readers will be curious enough to submit their contact information so that they can perhaps buy some of the product and try it out on their gardens in Floyd County.