BIOFUEL (bad) VERSUS BIOCHAR (good).
Top climate scientists (including the Coral Working Party of the prestigious UK Royal Society) say that we must return the atmospheric carbon dioxide (CO2) concentration from the present dangerous and damaging level of 390 parts per million (ppm) to a safe and subtainable level of about 300-350 ppm for a safe future for all peoples and all species (see " 300.org - return atmosphere CO2 to 300 ppm": http://sites.google.com/site/300orgsite/300-org---return-atmosphere-co2-to-300-ppm ).
The target of 300-350 ppm CO2 means that the world must REDUCE atmospheric CO2 as opposed tot eh current INCREASE at about 2 ppm per year. It is technically possible top achieve this target – all that is lacking is political will.
Climate Emergency Actions URGENTLY required are summarized below (see: http://sites.google.com/site/yarravalleyclimateactiongroup/climate-emergency-facts-and-required-actions ).
1. Change of societal philosophy to one of scientific risk management and biological sustainability with complete cessation of species extinctions and zero tolerance for lying.
2. Urgent reduction of atmospheric CO2 to a safe level of about 300 ppm as recommended by leading climate and biological scientists.
3. Rapid switch to the best non-carbon and renewable energy (solar, wind, geothermal, wave, tide and hydro options that are currently roughly the same market price as coal burning-based power) and to energy efficiency, public transport, needs-based production, re-afforestation and return of carbon as biochar to soils coupled with correspondingly rapid cessation of fossil fuel burning, deforestation, methanogenic livestock production and population growth.
Conversion of cellulosic biomass (cellulosic polysaccharide formula (CH2O)n ) to Biochar (charcoal, carbon, C) is achieved by anaerobic pyrolysis (heating to 400-700 degrees centigrade in the absence of oxygen: (CH2O)n. -> nC + nH2O) and represents a major technological means for drawing down CO2 from the atmosphere after biological photosynthetic generation of cellulose: nCO2 + nH2O -> (CH2O)n + O2 (see “Forest biomass-derived Biochar can profitably reduce global warming and bushfire risk”: http://sites.google.com/site/yarravalleyclimateactiongroup/forest-biomass-derived-biochar-can-profitably-reduce-global-warming-and-bushfire-risk ).
Burning biomass from photosynthesis (nCO2 + nH2O -> (CH2O)n + O2 ) through biomass (essentially (CH2O)n) conversion to biofuel (e.g. ethanol C2H5OH) and thence burning of biofuel to generate CO2 (C2H5OH + 3O2 -> 2CO2 + 3H2O) is the OPPOSITE of the beneficial and crucially important biochar mechanism ( nCO2 + nH2O -> (CH2O)n + O2; (CH2O)n. -> nC + nH2O; biochar, C, buried safely underground away from O2 ) .
In addition, biofuel generation from grain, oil or biomass carries a carbon debt from the associated land use change (e.g. methane generation from decaying biomass in logged tropical forests) and contributes to human mass mortality through biofuel famine from food price rises.
George Monbiot, who is an excellent leading commentator on the Climate Emergency (see “Woodchips with everything” “: http://www.monbiot.com/archives/2009/03/24/woodchips-with-everything/ ) has set up an incorrect “straw man” argument against a global biochar solution based on asserted huge areas of land required for biomass for biochar production.
Thus the key argument of George Monbiot is as follows and implies that virtually ALL the arable land of the world would have to be used.: “But that’s just the start of it. Carbonscape, a company which hopes to be among the first to commercialise the technique, talks of planting 930 million hectares(8). The energy lecturer Peter Read proposes new biomass plantations of trees and sugar covering 1.4 billion ha (9). The arable area of the United Kingdom is 5.7m hectares, or one 245th of Read’s figure. China has 104m ha of cropland. The US has 174m. The global total is 1.36 billion(10)”.
However is George Monbiot correct? NO – he ignores a potential total GtC (billions of tonnes of C) from forestry, grassland and agricultural waste (from 1.34 billion ha of arable land).
Thus p224, Progress in Thermochemical Biomass Conversion, volume 1, IAE Bioenergy, ed. A,V, Bridgewater (Blackwell Science) (see: http://books.google.com.au/books?id=rdqGX0LEg7sC&pg=PA224&lpg=PA224&dq=Gt++biomass+%22arable+land%22&source=bl&ots=KfEmoUUg6T&sig=EuLvPTf4uJHK6Wq7jbpQ3WLHcnM&hl=en&ei=UdzISZXlDpmMsQPH3cyMAQ&sa=X&oi=book_result&resnum=1&ct=result#PPP1,M1 ) informs us that we could obtain 1.7 GtC/yr (straw from agriculture) + 4.2 GtC/yr (total grass upgrowth from grasslands upgrowth) + 6 GtC/yr (possible sustainable woodharvest) = 11.9 GtC/yr.
From this one can see why biochar expert Professor Johannes Lehmann of Cornell University is correct calculating that it is realistically possible to fix 9.5bn tonnes of carbon per year using biochar, noting that global annual production of carbon from fossil fuels is 8.5bn tonnes (see: Alok Jha, “”Biochar’ goes industrial with giant microwaves to lock carbon in charcoal”, Guardian (13 March 2009): http://www.guardian.co.uk/environment/2009/mar/13/charcoal-carbon and Johannes Lehmann, Biochar for mitigating climate change: carbon sequestration in the black”: http://www.geooekologie.de/download_forum/forum_2007_2_spfo072b.pdf ).
One can see also why Professor Lovelock FRS is also correct in his assessment: ““There is one way we could save ourselves and that is through the massive burial of charcoal. It would mean farmers turning all their agricultural waste - which contains carbon that the plants have spent the summer sequestering - into non-biodegradable charcoal, and burying it in the soil. Then you can start shifting really hefty quantities of carbon out of the system and pull the CO2 down quite fast … The biosphere pumps out 550 gigatonnes [550 billion tonnes] of carbon [carbon dioxide, CO2] yearly; we put in only 30 gigatonnes [CO2]. Ninety-nine per cent of the carbon that is fixed by plants is released back into the atmosphere within a year or so by consumers like bacteria, nematodes and worms. What we can do is cheat those consumers by getting farmers to burn their crop waste at very low oxygen levels to turn it into charcoal, which the farmer then ploughs into the field. A little CO2 is released but the bulk of it gets converted to carbon. You get a few per cent of biofuel as a by-product of the combustion process, which the farmer can sell. This scheme would need no subsidy: the farmer would make a profit. This is the one thing we can do that will make a difference, but I bet they won't do it” (see Gaia Vince (2009), “One last chance to save mankind“, New Scientist, 23 January 2009: http://www.newscientist.com/article/mg20126921.500-one-last-chance-to-save-mankind.html?full=true and http://biocharfund.com/images/hansen%2C%20target%20atmospheric%20c02.pdf ).
Professor Lovelock’s estimates are consonant with those of Dr J.A. Harrison, specifically a terrestrial carbon fixation of 121.3 GtC/y (449 Gt CO2 = 449 billion tonnes of CO2) of which about half returns annually to the atmosphere through respiration and most of the remaining half returns to the air through the action of soil fungi and bacteria (see J.A. Harrison, “The carbon cycle “, Vision Learning: http://www.visionlearning.com/library/module_viewer2.php?mid=95&l=&let1=Ear )..
In short, George Monbiot is INCORRECT in this instance through setting up a “straw man” argument (pun intended).
Dr James Lovelock FRS has recently said what I have said above: "I usually agree with George Monbiot and love the way he says it but this time – with his assertion that the latest miracle mass fuel cure, biochar, doses not stand up – he has got it only half right.
Yes, it is silly to rename charcoal as biochar and yes, it would be wrong to plant anything specifically to make charcoal. So I agree, George, it would be wrong to have plantations in the tropics just to make charcoal.
I said in my recent book that perhaps the only tool we had to bring carbon dioxide back to pre-industrial levels was to let the biosphere pump it from the air for us. It currently removes 550bn tons a year, about 18 times more than we emit, but 99.9% of the carbon captured this way goes back to the air as CO2 when things are eaten.
What we have to do is turn a portion of all the waste of agriculture into charcoal and bury it. Consider grain like wheat or rice; most of the plant mass is in the stems, stalks and roots and we only eat the seeds. So instead of just ploughing in the stalks or turning them into cardboard, make it into charcoal and bury it or sink it in the ocean. We don't need plantations or crops planted for biochar, what we need is a charcoal maker on every farm so the farmer can turn his waste into carbon. Charcoal making might even work instead of landfill for waste paper and plastic " (see "James Lovelock on Biochar: let the Earth remove CO2 for us", UK Guardian, 24 March 2009: http://www.guardian.co.uk/environment/2009/mar/24/biochar-earth-c02 .
In my view biochar (charcoal) is very likely what can save the Planet's biosphere.
The technology is straightforward and has been used by charcoal makers for thousands of years, specifically heating plant material to 400-700 degrees Centigrade in the absence of oxygen (anaerobic pyrolysis) to generate carbon (C) from plant cellulose (roughly (CHO)n) .
Carbon (C) is stable (unless you set fire to it and have plenty of oxygen - neither being likely underground) whereas plant cellulose (roughly (CH20)n) is oxidized by soil organisms to yield the GHGs CO2 and H2O or worse still, converted by anaerobic bacteria to methane, CH4, which is about 20 times worse than CO2 as a greenhouse gas (GHG) on a 100 year time scale.
At present, the amount of biochar that can be made from plant waste each year is roughly the same as the amount of carbon released into the atmosphere each year from carbon burning by man - accordingly any further envisioned CO2 or other greenhouse gas (GHG) production is utterly profligate, irresponsible, ecocidal and terracidal.