Biochar consultant assignment in Indonesia

Thanks to Tom Miles for posting this...
https://groups.yahoo.com/neo/groups/biochar/conversations/messages/21615

Paul Olivier shares his wisdom from Vietnam

Paul shares more of his experience and wisdom to help connect the dots on the cascading use of biochar...

​---------- Forwarded message ----------
From: Paul Olivier
Date: 5 May 2017 at 13:42
Subject: on biochar and how its made

Biochar in a fermentation mix provides surface area for the formation of biofilm by fermentation microbes, and it enhances the efficiency of the fermentation process. When poultry and animals eat fermented biomass containing biochar, biochar helps to prevent the volatilization of N-compounds from fecal matter. When biochar is incorporated into animal bedding, biochar helps to prevent the escape of N-compounds from urine that flows into the bedding. When poultry and animals eat fermented feed containing biochar, biochar provides surface area for their gut microbes and enhances poultry and animal growth. When black soldier fly larvae eat the fresh fecal matter of poultry and animals containing biochar, biochar provides surface area for their gut microbes and accelerates larval growth. When red worms eat larval residue containing biochar, biochar provides surface area for their gut microbes and accelerates red worm growth. When vermicompost is formed in the presence of biochar, the surface activation of the biochar takes place. Vermicompost is rich in humic and fulvic acids that effect biochar activation. Vermicompost formed in the presence of biochar is, undoubtedly, the finest fertilizer that exists.

When vermicompost with biochar makes its way into the soil, biochar retains moisture and provides surface area for the proliferation of AM fungi that shuffle nutrients to plants. Biochar provides surface area to many other beneficial soil microbes, such as N-fixing and P-solubilizing microbes. In this context, the growth of fruit and vegetables can increase anywhere from 30% to 400% relative to soil fertilized with chemical fertilizers. As indigenous earthworms ingest biochar and transport it deep down into the soil, biochar is made available to additional groups of soil microbes that enhance the growth of deep-rooted plants such as orchard trees. The idea of putting biochar directly in the soil is somewhat short-sighted, since biochar can fulfill so many important functions before it makes its way into the soil. Biochar should always be understood in terms of its cascading multi-functionality.

Furthermore, the idea of making biochar in dedicated kilns where all of the gas and heat get wasted is also short-sighted. The demand for high-grade heat is enormous, and insofar as possible (even in developed countries), high-grade heat should not be produced from fossil fuels, electricity or the combustion of woody biomass. As one cooks a meal or boils water, one should be making biochar. As one dries, parches or roasts agricultural products, one should be making biochar. As one fry-cooks waste biomass or co-cropped biomass into feed, one should be making biochar. As one distills alcohol or essential oils, one should be making biochar. As one keeps houses and greenhouses warm in winter time, one should be making biochar. As one boils bone to make soup broth, one can make an extraordinary phosphorous-enriched biochar using pellets made from biomass and finely ground boiled bone derived from a previous boiling of bone. One can make broth and bone char/biochar at the same time. Bone char/biochar can be incorporated into a fermentation mix to enhance the fermentation process as well as the nutrient value of the fermented feed and all that cascades down from it. The list of such combined processes goes on and on.

Since biochar adds value at each step in a cascade, since biochar is worth more than the biomass from which it is derived, one has high-grade heat at a cost less than zero. High-grade heat is a by-product of making biochar, and biochar is a by-product of making high-grade heat. Why focus only on the production of high-grade heat as in the direct combustion of biomass? Or why focus only on the production of biochar in biochar kilns? In one simple process, preferably a low-cost batch process, one has both.

In conclusion, we should try to view biochar from the point of view of its cascading multi-functionality, and we should make that biochar in combined heat and biochar systems.

Thanks.
Paul Olivier
--
Paul A. Olivier PhD
27/2bis Phu Dong Thien Vuong
Dalat
Vietnam
Louisiana telephone: 1-337-447-4124 (rings Vietnam)
Mobile: 090-694-1573 (in Vietnam)
Skype address: Xpolivier
http://epwt.vn/en/home/

IBI Webinar - Biochar building materials & composites

 

International Biochar Initiative - Educational Webinar Series

 Biochar Building Materials & Composites

 May 23, 2017 • 5:00 - 6:30 pm EDT

While the use of biochar as a soil amendment has been researched for more than a decade, the use of carbonized biomass in building materials and other composites is just beginning to flourish.  Not only can carbon be sequestered in building materials, but using biochar can lower the embodied energy of such materials.  Importantly various properties of the building materials and composites can be enhanced when biochar is added to cement and other materials.  This Webinar brings together three of the leaders in the field of biochar use in building materials and composites to provide a glimpse into the latest research on this topic.
Hans-Peter Schmidt, head of the Ithaka Institute for Carbon Strategies, was an early pioneer in using biochar in plasters and concrete.  He applied his biochar enhanced plaster to his wine cellar as well as to the headquarters of the Ithaka Institute and has made a variety of different building materials.  Hans-Peter will provide an update on how his early biochar based materials have fared as well as an update on other more recent research collaborations on the use of biochar based materials in tunnels.
Harn Wei Kua, an Associate Professor at the National University of Singapore, has worked on sustainable building materials and methods for many years.  He has recently published a paper on the benefits of using biochar made from food waste and saw dust in cementitious mortar which will be described in this webinar.  He will also speak about the various concrete properties that biochar can improve.
John McDonald-Wharry is a researcher based in New Zealand that has been studying the use of biochar in various construction and composite materials.  He will provide an overview of how material properties typically change with increasing degree of carbonization (or charring intensity), and discuss different approaches to creating composite materials from chars and carbonized biomass.  John will also address various claimed functionality of char-containing composites and what evidence is currently available as well as some potential issues and challenges with biochar-containing composites and their research, development and implementation.
This webinar will be of interest to architects, urban planners, the construction industry, as well biochar producers, researchers, climate researchers and more.  An interactive Q&A period will follow at the end of the Webinar. 

Cost?

Free to IBI Members or $40 for non-members

To Register

Registration includes access to the slides and a recording of the webinar.
IBI Members register here (go to the upcoming webinars section). Your event link will be emailed to you after successful confirmation about your membership status.
Non-IBI members register here.

Presenters 

Hans-Peter Schmidt
Hans-Peter Schmidt has been a pioneer in the field of biochar since 2008.  He has worked on all aspects of biochar including the creation of a wide variety of biochar production equipment, biochar production in high and low technology scenarios, application techniques, field trial design, biochar characterization, and biochar education (creator of the Ithaka Journal).  In addition, Hans-Peter has designed and used biochar plaster as a building material and is working with researchers on its use in 3D printing. He has extensive experience working across Europe and has worked on developing world projects as well including Nepal, Bangladesh and Ghana.
  Harn Wai Kua
Associate Professor Kua is the current Assistant Dean (Academic) of the School of Design and Environment, and the co-leader of the Smart Materials Laboratory in the Department of Building of the National University of Singapore. He graduated from the Building Technology Program of MIT and his current research interest is in the areas of life cycle sustainability assessment of building materials and bio-based building materials that promote life cycle sustainability.


John McDonald-Wharry
John McDonald-Wharry completed a doctoral research project in chemistry and engineering at the University of Waikato which was started in 2010. This project involved developing structural models for char chemistry, researching techniques for the characterization of biomass chars, and the creation of composite materials from carbonized herbaceous leaf fibers. This research also involved chemical analysis of other carbonaceous materials such as activated carbons, carbon nanotubes, fullerenes, carbon fibers and graphites. In 2014, John was able to apply biochar screening and composite formulation know-how from PhD work to create a range of char-based composites from pine biochars produced by Massey University's New Zealand Biochar Research Centre. John is currently employed on an "Additive manufacturing and 3D and/or 4D printing of bio-composites" project involving composite formulation design and material science research.
Moderator:  Kathleen Draper
Kathleen is a member of the IBI Board and Chair of IBI's Information Hub. She is also the US Director of the Ithaka Institute for Carbon Intelligence. The Institute is an open source net work focusing on beneficial carbon sequestration strategies which simultaneously provide economic development opportunities both in the developed and developing world. She is an editor and writer for The Biochar Journal, sponsored by the Ithaka Institute. Kathleen also works with various different universities and individuals on projects that are investigating the use of biochar in cement and other building and packaging products to develop products with lower embodied carbon which can be made from locally available organic waste. She has written extensively about various topics related to biochar and is a co-author of the book "Terra Preta: How the World's Most Fertile Soil Can Help Reverse Climate Change and Reduce World Hunger".
For more information:
For more information or if you have any questions about registration please email Vera Medici at vmedici@ttcorp.com.  If you have suggestions for future webinars, please send them to: webinars@biochar-international.org.
If you are interested in learning more about the topic of biochar building material, consider attending the upcoming workshop Biochar From the Ground Up, June 12 - 16 in Summertown, Tennessee.
Want to become an IBI member?  Visit our membership page to help support IBI