[Stoves] [biochar] allAfrica.com: Africa: Biochar - Unfulfilled Promises in Cameroon

Wed Dec 28 14:06:19 CST 2011

Lists and ccs: 

See few inserts below. 

----- Original Message -----
From: "Tom Miles" <tmiles at trmiles.com> 
To: crispinpigott at gmail.com, "Discussion of biomass cooking stoves" <stoves at lists.bioenergylists.org> 
Sent: Wednesday, December 28, 2011 10:58:25 AM 
Subject: Re: [Stoves] [biochar] allAfrica.com: Africa: Biochar - Unfulfilled Promises in Cameroon 

Crispin, 

Good analysis. 
[RWL: Sorry, I have to disagree on most of Crispin's following analysis being good. I justify my disagreement on "good" below] 

Universal remedy. Biochar suffers from big expectations that can be 
regularly shattered. If biochar is applied in suitable circumstances in 
proportion to need then the results are likely to be more encouraging and 
may be within the reach of small scale production. 
[RWL: I think Tom here means small scale production with no carbon credits. If we take global warming seriously (and Crispin denies anthropogenic causation last I heard, so I don't expect him to agree it is "seriously" reasonable to happen) then we should expect to pay for our past pollution and numbers like $100/tonne char ($30/tonne CO2) are going to look pretty attractive to both small and large scale application. We are talking morality here, especially as regards the small stove user - and how those of us in developed countries owe something to wood-stove users that they can supply in larger measure of we pay up what we owe.] 

Application rate. Australian attempts to produce a "synthetic terra preta" 
may be helpful. According to Steven Joseph a mix of something like 1/3 
biochar with 1/3 clay and 1/3 nutrient source (e.g. poultry litter) can be 
used to make an "organo mineral complex" which gives results when applied at 
substantially lower rates than usually discussed. Blend of 10-20% biochar 
with compost may also reduce the amount of biochar needed to give good 
agronomic results. This can be done at a garden plot scale. 

Biochar is clearly work in progress but there are many applications that 
have shown positive results. There are many reasons to keep working on it. 

[RWL: Agree with all above except as I have added distinctions. I ask readers to compare what Tom is saying ("many reasons") with the very negative view of Biochar given next by Crispin (even though his first paragraph below is not as negative as the rest). 
We can add to the good application thought from Steven Joseph that there is also enthusiasm for adding certain rock dusts to the mix that are carbon-negative (create carbonates over time). This is a favorite message to us from David Yarrow. Also note that the Biochar mix doesn't have to be applied to the whole field - as discussed below. 

More below] 

Tom 

-----Original Message----- 
From: stoves-bounces at lists.bioenergylists.org 
[mailto:stoves-bounces at lists.bioenergylists.org] On Behalf Of Crispin 
Pemberton-Pigott 
Sent: Wednesday, December 28, 2011 5:12 AM 
To: Discussion of biomass cooking stoves 
Subject: Re: [Stoves] [biochar] allAfrica.com: Africa: Biochar - Unfulfilled 
Promises in Cameroon 

Dear Friends 

1. There is a reasonable review of the issues raised at 
http://geoengineeringpolitics.blogspot.com/2011/12/biochar-fund-giving-bioch 
ar-bad-name.html drawing the obvious conclusion that one project, good or 
bad, does not make or break a technology. 

[RWL: I believe the jury is still out on whether this Cameroon-Rademakers project was a good or bad project. We have heard only one (BFW) side of the story. Also Josh Horton at this "geoengineeringpolitics" site is basically questioning not supporting the BFW material - especially as it relates to Biochar. I urge others to read what Josh wrote. 

2. Readers will note from reports that the application rates were 10 to 20 
tons per hectare. This is the same range I used in my calculations for the 
stove-produced char earlier this year. The indications are that if stoves 
are to be a major source for biochar applied to agriculture, the timeline 
for conversion/meaningful application is not 7 years as indicated by Biochar 
Fund, but considerably longer. 

[RWL: There are quite a few stove projects out there with good (both output and economic) results after one year [thinking especially of Nat Mulcahy reports, but there are a number of other stoves list users reporting good results]. The char doesn't have to be spread as assumed here. Biochar can be applied only where the roots are. Nat also reports a user-preference for application where nothing can grow - the improvement is infinite when you start at zero ag output. ] 

3. If the charcoal production rate was 12.5% and the source material was 
wood, they applied about 20 tons per ha, and they used about 1/2 the biomass 
as wood input to the charcoal kiln, it means they used 320 tons of biomass 
to treat a hectare (320,000 kg). 
[RWL: These (factor of 16 between wood and char) numbers are not ones found in practice. Change 12.5% to 25% (many analysts are using 30% or even more) and that is all you need to do to get a ratio of 4 between wood and char for a TLUD stove. 

I can't figure what the phrase " they used about 1/2 the biomass as wood input to the charcoal kiln.." means. That should already be part of the (corrected) 25%. If it means half the input is corn stover, then the conversion goes in the other direction and the factor of 16 becomes a factor of 2 (if you accept that the average char output from a stove is 25% [using normal wood dryness - not bone-dry). 

Separately, change 20 t/ha to 0.1 t/ha (when using a small pit approach and an average of 10 t Char/ha. Using the possibility that the corn plants were planted in small pits and factor of 100 applied with 10 t C/ha only locally - not over the whole field (as in note just now sent in my response today to Alex English and "Buddelini" [which didn't go to the stove list]) - then we might be down to 100 kg/ha - about 3.5 orders of magnitude difference. Remember each plant is still seeing the equivalent of 10 t C/ha or 1 kg/sq m. The factor of 100 I am using comes from (perhaps, as an example) one plant in a square meter, and receiving 10 grams in a shallow "pit" of dimensions 10cm x 10 cm. I am not recommending that sort of application - which should be very species dependent - only that one can apply Biochar selectivity. Farmers are doing that today - to improve the economics. 

If a family were to produce cooking stove 
char at twice that efficiency at a rate of 0,5 kg per day, it would take 
320,000 days to treat one hectare, roughly a millenium. This is a 
statistically significant difference in the estimated time for biochar 
production. 

[RWL: These numbers would seem to imply 640,000 days??!! 
There are larger numbers than 0.5 kg/day floating around the charcoal-making stove world, but using that number and my alternatively stated average need above for 100 kg per ha, the poor stove using family would have covered the hectare in 200 days. Or maybe they can cover almost 2 ha per year (which is more land area than owned by most rural poor - so the amount applied per hectare or per seed can go up. 

This above argument rests in part on whether char can be applied strategically rather than globally. I will supply ASAP at least one video showing the small "pit" approach. 

If the char can for some reason only be applied globally and not in pits or rows, then there is probably an optimum amount (1 t char/ha??) applied to only a portion of the field. The point is that 320,000 days per hectare is not a correct computation. It is better to ask how much land can be covered when one is producing char at a rate of 0.5 or 1 kg/day. And how much profit can be achieved with that extra land output from a stove that is more than twice as efficient as that which it replaced. 

4. As there are suggestions that as much as 50% of applied char is missing 
(not sequestered) after only one year in some soils, so there maybe a need 
to re-apply char. There may be an upper limit for the carbon content of 
biologically active soil (self-limiting). It seems to confirm strong 
variability in the results. 
[RWL : Another bogey man. Certainly, in a few cases, some char applied only near the surface has disappeared (floated away) after heavy rains. I think we are talking here of a case amply described by Dr. Julie Major - but a citation for this 50% loss figure would be helpful. After 1000s of years the Terra Preta soil carbon content still is on the order of 10 times the native soil content . A factor of ten is a lot in the soil-carbon world. 
Recalcitrance is not as Crispin and BFW would have you believe. Also if the char does float away (even to the ocean) , it still should be considered "sequestered" - unless an explanation is given as to how and when it was transformed back to CO2. 
And yes one can certainly apply too much - and probably the reason for some reported crop reductions after applying Biochar. This wouldn't happen if proper test procedures were in place before the char application. The right amount depends on the char, the soil, and the species being grown. Someone placing 10 times too much is just plain stupid - and I doubt this will happen with TLUD stove users. 

5. What is not clear to me is that charcoal application to soil has anything 
like a universally positive result, or that cooking stoves offer a o 
meaningful way to produce the quantities required to see the beneficial 
effects, or that it would not be a great deal more efficient to make 
charcoal on site or alternatively, to just bury the biomass as a green 
manure fertiliser. Comparisons are required. 
[RWL: No one I know has claimed "universally positive" result; a citation would be helpful. Of course, applying willy-nilly is going to give some bad results. 
I would like to understand how any char production can be much more efficient or less costly than a TLUD stove. Cab you explain what provides greater efficiency or more cost economy than a TLUD? (with folks earning a dollar a day?) 
You are not reading the literature on comparing Biochar and compost. The difference (especially in the tropics where most TLUD use can be expected) is in the life time of the compost - maybe less than a year. Certainly, as Tom has said, some compost is appropriate, but we are talking on the stoves list of a charcoal co-product that comes with much better health and cost-savings impacts. 
Of course comparisons are required and they are out there in many places - and more coming in every month (at the IBI website) at an exponential rate. Biochar is a brand new entry in a very complicated soil science discipline. The experts are moving fast, with almost no funding, and the literature proves that. The charcoal-making stoves world can help a lot - contrary to your one-sided and not very understandable computations. 
I will go back to describing more (maybe today) on what I have learned about Laurens Rademakers and BFW - which is what this dialog started about. There is more than the Cameroon story. Anyone believing what they read from BFW is not reading carefully enough - and I would love to hear of a citation that anyone believes is proof of anything BFW has asserted. 

Ron 

Regards 
Crispin 
-----Original Message----- 
From: Kevin C <kchisholm at ca.inter.net> 
Sender: stoves-bounces at lists.bioenergylists.org 
Date: Tue, 27 Dec 2011 22:50:57 
To: <rongretlarson at comcast.net> 
Reply-To: Discussion of biomass cooking stoves 
<stoves at lists.bioenergylists.org> 
Cc: Erich Knight<erichjknight at gmail.com>; 
biochar-policy<biochar-policy at yahoogroups.com>; <biochar at yahoogroups.com>; 
Discussion of biomass<stoves at lists.bioenergylists.org> 
Subject: Re: [Stoves] [biochar] allAfrica.com: Africa: Biochar - Unfulfilled 
Promises in Cameroon 

Quoting rongretlarson at comcast.net: 

> Kevin and several lists: 
> 
> 1. You said below: "# I have read the BFW Report. What are the 
> "Selected Quotes" to which you refer? " 
> 
> Answer: They were in the cite I gave about a dozen lines earlier (my 
> second line under "2"): 
> 
> http://tech.groups.yahoo.com/group/biochar-production/message/833: 

<snip as not being pertinent> 
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