A new and innovative possible bio-fuel has been developed using wood chips by researchers from the University of Georgia. Little pieces of wood are heated in an oxygen-free environment to produce charcoal and gas. The gas can then be condensed into a liquid bio-oil which can then be processed into a fuel which could be mixed like bio-diesel. The charcoal might be able to be used as a fertilizer. Since much of the carbon from the wood or plant matter becomes charcoal, rather than part of the fuel, if the charcoal is put back into the ground as fertilizer. This fact would make this fuel net carbon negative.
June 18th, 2009 at 9:15 pm
i am interested to know if any work has been done along these lines with coal in lieu of wood chip. australia could use huge amounts of carbon fertiliser so if the energy from coal could be extracted in this way it would be a win win situation.
regards, fred scott
July 17th, 2009 at 8:43 am
We are most interested in this subject living here in South Africa. There are several reasons for it but here are some. 1) On the game farms in the area bush clearing is done on a regular basis to get rid of invader plants and to cut fire breaks in order to control veldt fires. 2) This is an ideal opportunity to create jobs for communities where there is no infrastructure for miles. 3) If the biofuel manufactured in this way can be supplied back to these generally very poor communities at cost (subsidised) it will mean that they will not deplete natural tress for firewood which is their essential cooking and heating requirements. More plants will be left to generate Oxygen. 4) If the produced charcaol does not emmit much smoke, this will save the atmosphere. 5) The bio-diesel manufactured in thia way can be used in the close proximity of production (to cut transport cost) in order to drive essential farming production vehicles.
Can anyone let us have more information and if possible e basic business plan around the system
thank you
Theo Pieterse
A caring South African
November 27th, 2009 at 10:02 pm
Usually I do not post on blogs, but I would like to say that this post really forced me to do so. Really nice post!
January 11th, 2010 at 2:39 am
“In listening to a concert, the music-lover experiences a joy qualitatively different from that experienced in listening to natural sounds, such as the murmur of a stream… Similarly [modern] painters provide … artistic sensations due exclusively to the harmony of lights and shades and independent of the subject depicted in the picture.”– Parisian art critic and poet Guillaume Apollinaire, On the Subject in Modern Painting, 1912.
December 28th, 2010 at 2:58 am
“The Biochar Revolution” with “The Biochar Solution”
http://biochar-books.com/
The Biochar Revolution collects the results and best practical advice that these entrepreneurs have to offer to the biochar community. When practice and theory advance to the point where they meet in the middle, then we will truly see a biochar revolution.