[Greenbuilding] New Type of Chipboard

[RT]

Unlike Dr. WatJohn who grew up on a working farm, I was born and raised in  
the city so have been removed from working the earth for a number of  
generations and as such, am talking out of my hat (some might say a  
completely different anatomical region) when it comes to agrarian  
knowledge but have comments nevertheless.

 From what I've seen, corn stover is even more "woody" than the "waste"  
residues  (ie straw) left over from growing cereal grains.

Decomposition of such cellulosic materials which are ploughed back into  
the soil consume valuable nitrogen from the soil and corn stover, being so  
woody, requires a long time to decompose.

So, in addition to depleting nitrogen from the soil (nitrogen being  
essential to leafy vegetative growth), the long decomposition time of the  
very coarse debris hinders planting of the next growing season's crop.

In the Olde Days, farmers dealt with these  issues by spreading manure  
(human or animal) fertiliser on their fields (ie the manure containing  
lots of nitrogen which helps to accelerate decomposition of the cellulosic  
crop residues and well as putting nitrogen into the soil) and then leaving  
the fields to remain fallow for a year before planting a different crop  
(ie crop rotation).

In Modern Day MegaFarming, leaving a field to lay fallow for a year would  
be an unspeakable sin, from the viewpoint of a financial bottom line and  
just not done.

So in the Olde Days, in addition to improving soil fertility without the  
use of the fertiliser equivalent of Monsanto crystal meth which has a  
similar effect on soil as does the Breaking Bad chemicals on humans , soil  
tilth (ie soil structure) would also be improved by having had the crop  
residues worked back into the soil.

Which is to say, in a long and roundabout way, in answer to Sanjay's  
musing, I would venture "Yes", working crop residues like corn stover back  
into the soil does make a significant contribution to sustainablity.

The health of soils in which such practises are utilised will be vastly  
different than the soils in which crop residues are removed and used to  
make stuff like building panels. The latter soils will most likely have a  
structure like concrete and be biologically burned out, essentially dead.

Without healthy soil, well, you know.

Which is to say the same thing as Dr. WatJohn but in way more words, the  
"new type of chipboard" was not a problem that needed to be solved.

(And I would have said the same even if I weren't such a hater of gumboard  
(aka OSB, aka crapboard) as a building material. )

-- 
=== * ===
Rob Tom . . . T60BOM
Kanata, Ontario, Canada

A r c h i L o g i c at Y a h o o dot C A
(manually winnow the chaff from my edress if you hit "reply")



On Wed, 17 Sep 2014 14:03:48 -0400, sanjay jain <sanjayjainuk at yahoo.co.uk>  
wrote:

> Interesting - did not know that Corn Stover is reused in this way.
>
>> Of course the vast majority of corn is fed to animals in factory farms.  
>> Animal agriculture being a significant >contributor to climate change.  
>> Not sure if working it back in the soil makes a significant  
>> contribution to sustainability.
>
> ~sanjay
>
>
>
>> From: John Straube <jfstraube at uwaterloo.ca>
> To: "sanjayjainuk at yahoo.co.uk" <sanjayjainuk at yahoo.co.uk>; Green  
> Building <greenbuilding at lists.bioenergylists.org>Sent: Tuesday,  
> September 16, 2014 5:07 PM
> Subject: Re: [Greenbuilding] New Type of Chipboard
>
> Corn stover is routinely worked back into the soil as it increases the  
> resistance to erosion and increase organic >structure and potash.Farmers  
> who don't look forward more than a year or two will bale up stover
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