Climatefarming in northern Senegal

Definition Climatefarming en francais

Definition Climate Farming

Climate farming uses agricultural means to keep carbon dioxide and other greenhouse gasses from escaping into the atmosphere. Like organic farming, climate farming maintains biodiversity and ecological balance on productive, argicultural land. But climate farmers like Hans-Peter Schmidt go a step further and covert leftover organic mass into biochar, a solid carbon compound that can improve soil quality. Biochar production also creates a kind of gas that can then be burned to help generate power. A climate farm could grow food, generate power, and help keep carbon out of the air.

Climatefarming – Pour une agriculture durable

von Hans-Peter Schmidt

Le climatefarming est souvent décrit comme une méthode agricole au moyen de laquelle du CO2 est prélevé de l’atmosphère et stocké de façon stable dans le sol sous forme de carbone. Ceci pourrait permettre de freiner le changement climatique. Mais le climatefarming, c’est également un concept écologique durable pour l’agriculture du future, qui produira aussi bien des denrées alimentaires que de l’énergie et de l’air propre, encouragera la biodiversité et protégera le paysage.

Au travers de leurs feuilles, les plantes prélèvent du dioxyde de carbone contenu dans l’air et le transforment à l’aide de la lumière, de substances minérales et de l’eau en molécules carboniques. Lorsque la plante meurt ou pourrit, ou si elle est mangée et digérée, les molécules longues de carbone sont de nouveau scindées. Ce processus libère de l’énergie et donc du carbone qui, composé à plus de 99% de CO2, s’évapore dans l’atmosphère. (en savoir plus ...)

Google News: deforestation

Climatefarmingprojekt Öfen für Afrika

Mittwoch, 29. Dezember 2010

Kleingärtner brauchen Kohle » Delinat-Blog

Kleingärtner brauchen Kohle » Delinat-Blog

Dies ist kein Aufruf zu Solidarität mit sozial bedürftigen Schrebergärtnern, sondern eine Zwischenbilanz zum Grossversuch des Delinat-Instituts. Im Frühjahr 2009 haben wir erstmals Biogärtner gesucht, die bereit sind, in ihrem Garten Versuche mit Biokohle zu machen. An rund 180 motivierte Freizeitforscher haben wir ein Paket mit 10kg Kohle und Anleitungen zum Versuchsaufbau verschickt. Die Biokohle stammt übrigens aus Grünabfällen, die in Europas erstem Pyrolyse-Reaktor in Lausanne verwertet werden.

Biokohle

Das Bild zeigt ein aufgebrochenes Holzkohlestück, das von einer Pflanzenwurzel durchwachsen ist. Die extrem feinen Wurzelhaare wachsen in die Mikroporen hinein und nehmen am regen Stoffwechsel im Innern der Kohle teil.

Bis Ende dieses Jahres werden am Delinat-Institut bereits Daten zu 65 Versuchen ausgewertet. Viele der Gärtner werden erst nächstes Jahr mit dem Versuch beginnen. Die Auswertung wird dann im Rahmen einer Masterarbeit fortgesetzt. Falls auch Sie Lust und Zeit haben, einen wertvollen Beitrag an dieses spannende Forschungsprojekt zu leisten, freut uns das. Wir suchen weitere Teilnehmer (s.u.) !

Der Versuch

Zur Auswahl standen bisher verschiedene Kulturen aus den Sparten Fruchtgemüse, Blatt- und Sprossgemüse, Wurzelgemüse, Beeren oder Blumen. Dieses Spektrum soll für eine bessere Verwertbarkeit der Daten in Zukunft reduziert werden. Es muss jeweils ein gleich grosses Beet mit Biokohle und eines ohne als Kontrolle/Referenz angelegt werden. Die Biokohle muss vorgängig mit Kompost vermischt werden. In Versuchs- und Kontrollfeld muss bei gleicher Fläche die gleiche Anzahl Pflanzen kultiviert werden. Die Gärtner sollen dann die Erntemengen während der Saison kontinuierlich protokollieren. Bei einjährigen Kulturen ist zudem erwünscht, dass sie nach der letzten Ernte die grüne oberirdische Biomasse wägen, welche nicht verwertet wird. Bei der Tomate sind dies beispielsweise der Spross mit den Blättern.

Auswertung

BiokohleDie Analyse der ersten Daten zeigt wie erwartet kein einheitliches Bild. Immerhin ist die Anzahl der positiven Ergebnisse (Mehrertrag mit Biokohle > 10%) doppelt so gross wie die der negativen (Minderertrag mit Biokohle > 10%). Biokohle ist nicht einfach ein Dünger, sondern ein langfristig wirksamer Bodenverbesserer. Die Wirkung hängt zudem von vielen Faktoren ab, wie Bodentyp, Bodengeschichte, Bewässerung und Kompostqualität. Zudem reagieren unterschiedliche Pflanzenfamilien unterschiedlich auf Veränderungen im Boden. Kohlgewächse beispielsweise haben eine sehr positive Bilanz gezeigt, Karotten eher negativ auf die Kohle reagiert. Wenn sie an den Details interessiert sind, steht Ihnen unserer Ithaka-Artikel zur Verfügung.

Mitforschen

Für uns ist es eine tolle Erfahrung, mit Kleingärtnern aus der ganzen Schweiz zusammenzuarbeiten! Wenn sie gerne Teil des Forschungsnetzwerkes werden möchten, melden Sie sich einfach mit Ihrer Postadresse beim Delinat-Institut an. Da sich die Versandkosten und die Betreuungsstunden bei mehreren hundert Teilnehmern massiv summieren, müssen wir einen Unkostenbeitrag von CHF 35,– erheben.

Claudio Niggli, Delinat-Institut Autor:
Claudio Niggli,
Delinat-Institut

Sonntag, 19. Dezember 2010

Soil Erosion and Food Security

Editor’s Note: A recent report from the Food and Agriculture Organization (FAO) of the UN has concluded that soil erosion is a critical threat to food security. Increasing world population means that more food will need to be produced. Yet little new land exists for cultivation. Further, farmland is being lost at an accelerating rate due to erosion, desertification and salinisation. Solutions to combat these problems are presented in this article from the Guardian including tree belts and crop substitution.

Soil erosion threatens to leave Earth hungry Arable land is turning to desert or to salt at an ever-faster rate, lessening the hope that we can feed our booming population

John Vidal Guardian Weekly, Tuesday 14 December 2010 14.00 GMT

Within 40 years, there will be around 2 billion more people – another China plus India – on Earth. Food production will have to increase at least 40%, and most of that will have to be grown on the fertile soils that cover just 11% of the global land surface.

There is little new land that can be brought into production, and existing land is being lost and degraded. Annually, says the UN’s food and agricultural organisation, 75bn tonnes of soil, the equivalent of nearly 10m hectares of arable land, is lost to erosion, waterlogging and salination; another 20m hectares is abandoned because its soil quality has been degraded.

The implications are terrifying. “The world is facing a serious threat of a major food shortage within the next 30 years. We are trying to grow more food on less land while facing increased costs for fertiliser, fuel and a short supply of water,” says Professor Keith Goulding, head of sustainable soils at Rothamsted research station and president of the British society of soil science.

Lester Brown, president of the Worldwatch Institute in Washington, says it takes between 200 and 1,000 years to renew 2.5cm of soil. “The thin layer of topsoil that covers the planet’s land surface is the foundation of civilisation. This soil, typically 6 inches [15cm] or so deep, was formed over long stretches of geological time as new soil formation exceeded the natural rate of erosion. But sometime within the last century, as human and livestock populations expanded, soil erosion began to exceed new soil formation over large areas.”

Soil erosion is not a high priority among governments and farmers because it usually occurs so slowly that its cumulative effects take decades to become apparent, says David Pimentel, professor of agricultural sciences at Cornell University. “The removal of 1 millimetre of soil is so small that it goes undetected. But over a 25-year period the loss would be 25mm, which would take about 500 years to replace by natural processes.”

Soil erosion also leads to lower crop productivity because of loss of water, organic matter and soil nutrients. A 50% reduction in soil organic matter has been found to reduce corn yields by 25%. Countries are losing soil at different rates. The US, which just avoided turning the Great Plains into a dust bowl in the 1930s, is still losing soil 18 times more rapidly than it is forming it.

China’s desertification may be the worst in the world, Brown says. “Wang Tao, a leading desert scholar, reports that from 1950 to 1975 an average of 600 square miles [1,550 sq km] turned to desert each year. By century’s end, nearly 1,400 square miles [3,600 sq km] were going to desert annually. Over the last half-century, some 24,000 villages in northern and western China have been entirely or partly abandoned as a result of being overrun by drifting sand.”

The problem is highly visible in the grasslands of Africa, the Middle East and central Asia. In 1950, Africa was home to 227 million people and 273 million livestock. By 2007, there were 965 million people and 824 million livestock.

Countries are waking up to the problem. The African Union has launched the Green Wall Sahara Initiative to combat desertification across the Sahel. This plan, originally proposed by Olusegun Obasanjo when president of Nigeria, calls for planting 300m trees on 3m hectares in a long band stretching across Africa.

Senegal, which is currently losing 50,000 hectares of productive land each year, would anchor the green wall at the west. Modou Fada Diagne, Senegal’s environment minister, says, “Instead of waiting for the desert to come to us, we need to attack it.”

In July 2005, the Moroccan government, responding to severe drought, announced that it was allocating $778m to cancelling farmers’ debts and converting cereal-planted areas into less vulnerable olive and fruit orchards.

China defends itself against the Gobi desert by planting a 4,480km, belt of trees from outer Beijing through Inner Mongolia. The goal was to plant trees on 10m hectares, but pressures to expand food production appear to have slowed the tree planting.

New farming practices are also being introduced. Instead of the traditional practices of ploughing land then harrowing it to prepare the seedbed, farmers drill seeds directly through crop residues into undisturbed soil, controlling weeds with herbicides. In the US, the no-till area went from 7m hectares in 1990 to 27m hectares in 2007. No-till farming has spread rapidly and now covers 26m hectares in Brazil, 20m hectares in Argentina, 13m in Canada and 12m in Australia.

The best hope may lie in the global climate change talks, which have recognised that nearly 30% of all carbon is released from deforestation, the conversion of peat lands and degradation of soils. If agreement can be reached to reward reforestation and conservation, there is some hope that the next 2 billion people may be fed.

- – - – -

WHO WE ARE: Foodforethought is an information service that encourages dialogue and exploration of innovative trends in the global food system. The service is managed by James Kuhns of MetroAg Alliance for Urban Agriculture in collaboration with Wayne Roberts and the Toronto Food Policy Council. To subscribe, please contact editor@foodforethought.net.

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Freitag, 10. Dezember 2010

CABI | News & media | CABI to push for soil health knowledge in Africa

CABI to launch major push for improved soil health knowledge across Africa
Project will give farmers and policymakers in Sub-Saharan Africa knowledge they can use to improve soil fertility and boost farm productivity for millions
Press release, 6 December 2010

CABI, the non-profit science and development organization, has received funding from the Bill & Melinda Gates Foundation that will contribute to radical change in the understanding and use of Integrated Soil Fertility Management (ISFM) techniques in Sub-Saharan Africa, enabling smallholder farmers to grow more and better crops.

The four-year, $4.5 million project will work closely with scientists from research institutes in the region and Europe and in ongoing development initiatives, particularly the AGRA Soil Health Program. Using an open consortium approach, it will ensure that the wealth of research and new information available on the subject of ISFM is successfully brought together, communicated, and translated into action by everyone involved in farming systems development – from policymakers and university lecturers to extension workers, input suppliers and the farmers themselves.

“Soil fertility degradation has been described as the second most serious constraint to food security in Africa,” said Morris Akiri, Regional Director, CABI Africa. “After decades of reliance on biological approaches to soil fertility improvement, partly because fertilizer has not been easily available, agriculture experts now agree on the need to integrate fertilizer use with other aspects of soil fertility management. However, there is a desperate lack of knowledge, not only amongst farmers but amongst service-providers and decision-makers too. This project will address that knowledge gap.”


CABI | News & media | CABI to push for soil health knowledge in Africa

Mittwoch, 8. Dezember 2010

Does Biochar Deliver Carbon-Negative Energy? | Energy Seminar

Does Biochar Deliver Carbon-Negative Energy? | Energy Seminar

Does Biochar Deliver Carbon-Negative Energy?

Johannes Lehmann, Associate Professor of Soil Biogeochemistry and Soil Fertility Management, Cornell University

Wednesday, May 19, 2010 | 04:15 PM - 05:15 PM | Building 420, Room 40 | Free and Open to All

Averting dangerous climate change was central to the agenda in Copenhagen, but viable strategies to meet energy needs and at the same time reduce greenhouse gas emissions have not been sufficiently explored. Agricultural carbon provides tremendous theoretical opportunity, but just how to weave carbon sequestration by soils into modern carbon management is not clear.


Biochar systems may offer a theoretical way forward, but have been met with as much criticism as enthusiasm. Some herald biochar as the sole solution that can save us from climate collapse, while others see a scam of global proportions looming, or at best a failure as through past efforts to use biomass for energy. Whether friend or foe, scientific inquiry is starting to provide some answers to the most contentious issues. Basic assumptions have been addressed and show the site dependency that can be expected from managing agricultural landscapes and complex feedstock streams. But final assessment is still outstanding and will depend on evaluation of biochar systems at scale of implementation. The complexity of biochar systems may be both a strength in its ability to address multiple sustainability issues, but also a challenge in timely and global implementation.

Bio:
Johannes Lehmann, associate professor of soil biogeochemistry and soil fertility management at Cornell University, received his graduate degrees in Soil Science at the University of Bayreuth, Germany. Prior to his appointment at Cornell, he coordinated a research project on nutrient and carbon management in the central Amazon where he started work on Terra Preta soils. During the past 10 years, he has focused on nano-scale investigations of soil organic matter, the biogeochemistry of black carbon and the development of biochar and bioenergy systems. Dr. Lehmann is co-founder and Chair of the Board of the International Biochar Initiative, and member of the editorial boards of Nutrient Cycling in Agroecosystems and Plant and Soil.

Dienstag, 7. Dezember 2010

Biochar: Building Synergies between Agriculture, Renewable Energy Production & Carbon Sequestration

Biochar: Building Synergies between Agriculture, Renewable Energy Production & Carbon Sequestration

GOODSPEED KOPOLO, PRESIDENT OF ZAMBIA BIOCHAR TRUST & BIOCHAR EUROPE CHRISTOPH STEINER, FOUNDER, BIOCHAR.ORG

Biochar offers one of those rare things in the climate change arena – a real win solution. As referred to under AFOLU – Agriculture, forestry and other land use have a unique potential to sequester carbon. Annual sequestration rates by living biomass amount to approximately 100 to 120 billion tons of carbon from the atmosphere.

day403webApproximately the same amount is released by plant respiration and decay of dead plant material. The 60 billion tons released from decomposing biomass is almost 10 times more carbon than released by fossil fuel burning.

In light of this, it needs to be recognized that humans currently appropriate more than a third of the production of terrestrial ecosystems. This is a lot of carbon in our hands! It is important to consider the difficulties of changing a GHG source into a sink. Such a transformation needs to grapple with multiple considerations and ensure it doesn’t compete with food production as is the case with biofuels, soil fertility is not compromised, it is consistent with a changing climate and the change can be quantifiable.

Proposals for agricultural and forestry biomass utilization typically focus only on carbon sequestration or bioenergy production, failing to address the issues in tandem. Some suggest maximizing carbon sequestration by the burial of crop residues in the deep ocean or the storage of trees underground. On the other hand, maximizing renewable energy production from crops and crop residues should substitute for fossil fuels (an option currently eligible for carbon trading). However both these options neglect the removal of nutrients and carbon and its beneficial effects on soil fertility. It is imperative that carbon management does not compete with food production and/or compromise soil fertility.

The drawback of conventional carbon enrichment in soils (such as reduced tillage intensity) is that this carbon sink option depends on climate, soil type and site specific management. The issues of permanence, leakage and additionality are the greatest obstacles for land use and forestry (LULUCF and REDD) carbon projects. Furthermore, the permanence and vulnerability of these sinks is likely to change in a warming climate. Therefore carbon sequestered by LULUCF projects is generally considered only temporarily sequestered. The CDM board and Gold Standard deals with these challenges by either excluding or strictly limiting LULUCF projects.

Biochar Carbon Sequestration

Biochar may offer a tool to deal with these issues. Biochar is carbonized plant material produced by pyrolysis. Pyrolysis facilitates renewable energy production, and the remaining carbon (biochar) can be redistributed to agricultural fields to improve soil fertility. This facilitates crop residue utilization, soil carbon sequestration and enhancement of soil fertility in a synergistic way.

Carbonization of biomass increases the half-life time of the remaining carbon (50%) by order of magnitudes and can be considered a manipulation of the carbon cycle. While fire accelerates the carbon cycle the formation of biochar (= carbonized plant material, charcoal, black carbon) decelerates the carbon cycle. Biochar production transforms carbon from the active (crop residues or trees) to the inactive carbon pool. Therefore issues of permanence, land tenure, leakage, and additionalty are less significant for biochar projects.

Biochar sequestration of carbon might avoid difficulties such as accurate monitoring of soil carbon which is another main barrier to include agricultural soil management in emission trading. Independently from its use as soil amendment the turnover rate and the quantity of carbon could be used to assess the carbon sequestration potential.

Land tenure

The exclusiveness of rights to the land is one fundamental precondition for REDD and payments for environmental services. This poses another obstacle, in particular for small farmers. Insecure tenure reduces the incentive for long-term fertility improvements and those receiving the payments cannot exclude other people who could use forest and land resources in ways that are incompatible with providing the contracted service.

This does not apply for biochar carbon sequestration because the carbon once sequestered in the soil is permanent. There is no risk that altered management practices would reduce the carbon stock. Terra Preta soils in the Amazon Basin proof that.

An obstacle of acceptance:

Most carbon offset schemes do not accept the avoidance of CO2 emissions from decomposing plant material. The definition of a carbon sink should be revised to include the difference between a sink to the inactive carbon pool, such as biochar, and a sink that remains in the active carbon pool, such as reforestation.

Nevertheless, article 3.3 of the Kyoto Protocol counts carbon stock change in soil, as well as biomass. Article 3.4 allows parties to include sequestration in plants and soil through management of cropland, grazing and land and existing forests. The Millennium Development Goals (MDG) Carbon Facility’s mission is to improve access to carbon finance enabling a wider range of developing countries and project types to participate in the carbon market. They promote projects that generate additional sustainable development and poverty reduction benefits, thereby contributing to all MDGs. The Facility operates within the framework of the Clean Development Mechanism and Joint Implementation and is a joint project between UNEP and Fortis Bank. As such it might provide support to include biochar C offsets in the compliance market.

In this way Biochar is different from trade reductions in current emissions. Because biochar is an effective and permanent carbon sink, it has the potential to recapture historic emissions, thus providing an important path for industrialized nations to reduce their historic carbon dept. Therefore, on top of all its other attractions, biochar may present a pathway for negotiating reductions in GHG emissions with fast-growing economies such as China and India.

Last Updated (Friday, 03 December 2010 11:37)



Biochar: Building Synergies between Agriculture, Renewable Energy Production & Carbon Sequestration

Donnerstag, 2. Dezember 2010

eGenesis Industries : TERRA-PRETA-BIOCHAR

Terra Preta & Biochar

Terra Preta (which means "dark soil" in Portuguese), refers to expanses of very dark soils found in the Amazon Basin.

This lost secret from the Amazon is now being studied extensively by thousands of scientists and a multitude of universities around the globe. Several articles have been written about this sustainable agricultural system that allowed millions of people to thrive on some of the world's worst soils. They study this subject matter under the scientific term biochar, instead of terra preta research. Dr. Lehmann of Cornell University has explained that these soils were formed due to large applications of charred biomass and "These applications were most likely a result of both habitation activities and deliberate soil application by Amerindian populations before the arrival of Europeans (Erickson et al. 2003). Large amounts of bio-char derived carbon stocks remain in these soils today, hundreds and thousands of years after they were abandoned."

Dr. Lehmann also explains that..." The application of bio-char, or biomass-derived black carbon (C)) to soil is proposed as a novel approach to establish a significant, long-term, sink for atmospheric carbon dioxide in terrestrial ecosystems. Apart from positive effects in both reducing emissions and increasing the sequestration of greenhouse gases, the production of bio-char and its application to soil will deliver immediate benefits through improved soil fertility and increased crop production. Conversion of biomass C to bio-char C leads to sequestration of about 50% of the initial C... Bio-char soil management systems can deliver tradable C emissions reduction, and C sequestered is easily accountable, and verifiable.

Research papers

Glaser, B., Lehmann, J. and Zech, W. 2002. "Ameliorating physical and chemical properties of highly weathered soils in the tropics with charcoal - a review", Biology and Fertility of Soils 35 , 219-230.

Hansen, James, Makiko Sato, Pushker Kharecha, David Beerling, Valerie Masson-Delmotte, Mark Pagani, Maureen Raymo, Dana L. Royer, James C. Zachos, "Target Atmospheric CO2: Where Should Humanity Aim?"  , In press. [Supporting materials  ]. [This key paper by leading climate scientist James Hansen explicitly mentions biochar as an important strategy needed to reduce atmospheric CO2 levels from the current 387ppm to 350ppm].

Lehmann, J. 2007. "A handful of carbon", Nature 447, 143-144.

Lehmann, .J, Gaunt, J. and Rondon, M. 2006. "Bio-char sequestration in terrestrial ecosystems – a review", Mitigation and Adaptation Strategies for Global Change 11, 403-427.

Lehmann J. 2007. "Bio-energy in the black." Frontiers in Ecology and the Environment 5, 381-387.

Lehmann J. and Rondon M. 2006. "Bio-char soil management on highly weathered soils in the humid tropics". In Uphoff N. (ed.) Biological Approaches to Sustainable Soil Systems. CRC Press, Boca Raton , FL. pp.517-530.

Lehmann, J., da Silva Jr., J.P., Steiner, C., Nehls, T., Zech, W. and Glaser, B. 2003. "Nutrient availability and leaching in an archaeological Anthrosol and a Ferralsol of the Central Amazon basin: fertilizer, manure and charcoal amendments", Plant and Soil 249 , 343-357.

Liang, B. , Lehmann, J., Solomon, D., Kinyangi, J., Grossman, J., O'Neill, B., Skjemstad, J.O., Thies, J., Luizão, F.J., Petersen, J. and Neves, E.G. 2006. "Black carbon increases cation exchange capacity in soils", Soil Science Society of America Journal 70: 1719-1730.

Marris, E. 2006. "Black is the new green", Nature 442: 624-626.

Mikan, C.J. and Abrams, M.D. 1995. "Altered forest composition and soil properties of historic charcoal hearths in southeastern Pennsylvania", Canadian Journal of Forestry Research 25, 687-696.

Okimori, Y., Ogawa, M. and Takahashi, F. 2003. "Potential of CO2 emission reductions by carbonizing biomass waste from industrial tree plantation in south Sumatra , Indonesia", Mitigation and Adaptation Strategies for Global Change 8 , 261-280.

Pessenda, L.C.R., Gouveia, S.E.M. and Aravena, R. 2001. "Radiocarbon dating of total soil organic matter and humin fraction and its comparison with 14 C ages of fossil charcoal", Radiocarbon 43 , 595-601.

Schmidt, M.W.I. and Noack, A.G. 2000. ‘Black carbon in soils and sediments: analysis, distribution, implications, and current challenges', Global Biogeochemical Cycles 14 , 777-794.

Seifritz, W. 1993. "Should we store carbon in charcoal?", International Journal of Hydrogen Energy 18 , 405-407.

Shindo, H. 1991. "Elementary composition, humus composition, and decomposition in soil of charred grassland plants", Soil Science and Plant Nutrition 37 , 651-657.

Sombroek, W., Nachtergaele, F.O. and Hebel, A. 1993. "Amounts, dynamics and sequestering of carbon in tropical and subtropical soils", Ambio 22, 417-426.

Steiner, C., Teixeira, W. G., Lehmann J., Nehls, T., Vasconcelos de Macêdo, J. L. V., Blum, W. E. H. and Zech, W. 2007. "Long term effects of manure, charcoal and mineral fertilization on crop production and fertility on a highly weathered Central Amazonian upland soil", Plant and Soil. 291, 275-290.

Warnock, D.D., Lehmann, J., Kuyper, T.W. and Rillig, M.C. 2007. "Mycorrhizal responses to biochar in soil – concepts and mechanisms", Plant and Soil 300, 9-20.

Woods, William I., Newton P. S. Falcão, and Wenceslau G. Teixeira. 2006. "Biochar Trials aim to enrich soil for smallholders". Nature 443:144.

Woolf, Dominic. "Biochar as a Soil Amendment - A review of the Environmental Implications" , January 2008, Swansea University.

Yaman, S. 2004. "Pyrolysis of biomass to produce fuels and chemical feedstocks", Energy Conversion and Management 45 , 651-671.

Yanai, Y., Toyota, K. and Okazani, M. 2007. "Effects of charcoal addition on N2O emissions from soil resulting from rewetting air-dried soil in short-term laboratory experiments." Soil Science and Plant Nutrition 53, 181-188.

International Rice Research Institute: "Black Soil, Green Rice", Rice Today (April-June 2007).

Books

Lehmann, Johannes; Kern, Dirse C.; Glaser, Bruno and Woods, William I. Amazonian Dark Earths: Origin, Properties, Management. Springer, January 2004, 523 pages.

Steiner, Christoph. Slash and Char as Alternative to Slash and Burn - soil charcoal amendments maintain soil fertility and establish a carbon sink . Cuvillier Verlag, Bayreuth. December 2007. [Summary].

Conferences and symposia

Biochar at the UNCCD Side event at the United Nations Climate Change Conference Bali, 13 December 2007

Goodspeed Kopolo; UNCCD (presentation).  Harnessing the results in a sustainable loop that enhances adaptation to and mitigation of climate change effort in synergistic ways that also help achieve the Millennium Development Goals.

Prof. Dr. Wolfgang Zech; University of Bayreuth (presentation).  An overview of naturally occurring soil carbon, its depletion and how to redress this trend. The origin of Terra Preta soils and how their replication could have the most significant impact on the achievement of the targets of the World Food Summit.

Dr. Christoph Steiner; University of Georgia (presentation).  Soil charcoal amendments: maintaining soil fertility, reducing soil vulnerability, and establishing a carbon sink.

Symposium at the Annual Meeting of the American Academy for the Advancement of Science (AAAS) on "Amazonian Dark Earths - New Discoveries" in February 2006.

Symposium and Workshop at the World Congress of Soil Science (WCSS) "Amazonian Dark Earth Soils (Terra Preta and Terra Preta Nova): A Tribute to Wim Sombroek" and Workshop "Bio-char as a Soil Amendment - Research Priorities and Challenges" in July 2006.

On April 29-May 2, 2007, the International Agri-char Initiative (IAI), founded at the WCSS in 2006, held its first international meeting in Terrigal, Australia. Read more about it under http://www.iaiconference.org/. Information about the presentations can be found here.

Documentaries

ABC Science TV: Catalyst, 2007: Agrichar - A Solution to Climate Change? [Streaming video, or Youtube ]. Presents an overview of biochar research, trials and potential in Australia. The film also shows a pyrolysis technology that yields both char and syngas. The syngas powers the pyrolysis process, excess is used for electricity generation. [Transcript here].

BBC Horizon documentary, 2002. "The Secret of El Dorado." 46 minutes. Explores the science behind terra preta soils. Near the end of the programme, the makers show contemporary research and trials with biochar.

MDR/ARTE documentary, 2005. "Terra Preta - Das schwarze Gold des Amazonas". [Fragment one , fragment two ]

Interviews

Beyond Zero Emissions: Drawing down carbon - Johannes Lehmann of Cornell University talks Biochar. [Podcast: mp3 format, 28 minutes]: Professor Lehmann explains the concept and says we can and should start to implement it right away because it allows us to remove CO2 from the atmosphere.

Beyond Zero Emissions: Australian of the Year 2007, Tim Flannery talks biochar and why we need to move into the renewable age. [Podcast: mp3 format, 26 minutes]: Professor Tim Flannery explains why Terra Preta (Amazonian Dark Earths) and biochar are so important in the climate fight. The potential of the concept is discussed as well as its costs. Flannery is a paleontologist and conservationist, and former director of the South Australia Museum. He is a professor at Macquarie University (Sydney) and was a professor of Australian Studies at Harvard University.

Beyond Zero Emissions: More Carbon for Soils, More Carbon for Crops - Carbon Negative Farming with Biochar . [Podcast: mp3 format, 28 minutes]: Dr Lucas Van Zwieten, senior research scientist of the NSW Department of Primary Industries (DPI), Australia, discusses biochar trials. In a latest series of trials he found a doubling of biomass and grain yields for sweet corn and 'very significant' differences in corn production. Likewise, some biochars have shown "very, very significant reductions in nitrous oxide emissions from the soil; between five- and ten-fold reductions in nitrous oxide emissions." Van Zwieten is currently conducting large scale tests with biochar on sugarcane.

Bio Char Links

Biochar Wiki
Biochar Fund.
Biochar.org
International Biochar Initiative





eGenesis Industries : TERRA-PRETA-BIOCHAR

Biochar, terrapreta - Google News

soil carbon or biochar - Google News

"Biochartechnologies" via Joerg