[Stoves] No subsidies in TLUD char peoduction

[Julien Winter]

Hello all;

Thanks for you comments on the Akha-Biochar Project in Bangladesh.

The cost and payback is not fully worked out, because it will take about a
year for TLUD-biochar ecosystem to become established in community, and it
will continue to evolve. The stove costs about $20 to make, this could be
brought down as numbers of stoves increase.  Also, we are still at the
stove-prototype stage, so we can expect some modifications and fine
tuning.    Payback is developing, as farmers and gardeners discover the
value of biochar for food production.  We have "Farmer Biochar User Groups"
that are conducting field trials, so they can learn from first-hand
experience what biochar can do for them.  There are also graduate students
involved in gathering evidence to make recommendations on optimum
application rates.  It could take a couple of years at any one location for
the local population to be able to place their own value on biochar, and
what they are willing to pay for it.

Whether people use the char themselves or sell it depends on their personal
opportunities.  There are many families that are landless. Presently, they
see char sales as a way to earn cash or barter. They think that is a great
idea; save fuel, cook faster, AND make biochar!  People with land,
especially farmers, see biochar as a way of making permanent improvements
to the quality of their land, so expect that using biochar could have very
substantial impact on their family's economic well being.

I have been advocating using biochar in composting, or mixing it with
manure before it goes onto the field.  We need work on using it in human
waste management.

There is no shortage of good soil scientists and agronomists in Bangladesh
to work on biochar technology.

The outer concrete cylinder of the Akha stove is cast.  We have made stoves
with concrete reactors (lined with clay slip), but their smoke-free
combustion was less reliable, and there were some gas burner issues to
solve.  That is not to say that concrete reactors will not work, but they
need quite a bit of research and development, and a laboratory.  Metal TLUD
reactors, on the other hand, are well understood.  About 24 small holes in
the side wall of the metal reactor make the gasification of chunks of wood
more reliable, and less prone loosing the gas flame.  We use cast concrete
(rather than clay) because it is easy to get concrete rings with flat
surfaces at the top and bottom. The concrete components are made
specifically for the Akha.  There are many small business around who can
cast concrete.

Mahbubul has been working with different ratios of Portand cement, sawdust
and biochar dust in the concrete. The more organics, the lower the heat
capacity and heat conductivity of the stove body. Micro porosity is
supposed to make concrete more resistant heat by providing spaces for
minerals to expand into.  Obviously there is a trade-off between adding
organics and strength of the concrete.  Different recipes are being tested
in the field.  It is all trial and error.

Mahbubul has also worked with local ceramic artisans to make the massive
stove components from clay.  There very skilled people to work with, and
kaolinitic clay, so ceramic components are possible.  The more metal
components on the stove that we can replace with ceramics the better,
because all metal in Bangladesh is imported.

The Akha is about 25% more efficient than a traditional stove.  The Akha
has gone through a water-boiling test at a laboratory in Dhaka, and was
about 30% efficient at getting energy from wood into the water.  The main
view that the Akha saves 25% of the wood comes from household feedback.
That is what the women tell us.

The Akha-Biocahr Project has funding for its current intervention until
2019. It is enough to see if the TLUD-biochar technology will take root.
If it does, then the technology may spread all by itself as local
entrepreneurs see an opportunity.  In fact, I think that if these
technologies viable, then they will out of our control and unstoppable.
The 'market' is 25 million homes.  All the same, I am trying to raise money
so that Mahbubul and crew remain as proponents and stakeholders in what
they started.  There is work to be done in developing compressed fuels,
because there is not enough wood in the country.  We need to monitor the
impact on forest cover, and make sure that poorest households don't become
energy-starved if the price of wood goes up.

One other thing that will push TLUD-biochar technology forward is that
sea-level rise could flood a third of the country, so soil productivity
needs to increase.

Cheers,
Julien.

-- 
Julien Winter
Cobourg, ON, CANADA
-------------- next part --------------
An HTML attachment was scrubbed...
URL: <http://lists.bioenergylists.org/pipermail/stoves_lists.bioenergylists.org/attachments/20171207/1b4cc4d5/attachment.html>