Another missed opportunity

Judges decide no winner in Rotorua Land Innovation Challenge

11 Jun 2014

“A competition aimed at finding viable alternative land uses for landowners in the Lake Rotorua catchment did not find a winner.

While several entries for the Innovation Challenge were deemed to have potential, the judging panel found they did not address all key components of the competition. Entries needed to provide for long-term, measurable nitrogen reductions as well as provide research and analysis to show the business case detailing the solution’s economic viability.

The competition was run as part of the Rotorua Te Arawa Lakes Programme to find solutions to reduce nitrogen from land use for water quality objectives. Entries received ranged from changes to land management practices and robotic devices to treat urine patches, to alternative horticultural crops that can be grown in the Rotorua district. ….”

http://www.rotorualakes.co.nz/latest_news/id/268

Demonstrating the technical efficacy and economic justification for biochar solutions may have been an interesting challenge… but worthy of some effort if notice of this challenge had been seen.

I’m hoping the door will be open to future engagement on Rotorua lakes nutrient management based on recent positive dialogue with BOPRC. More on this later in the year. Other related posts…

https://soilcarbon.org.nz/tag/water-quality/

TLUD utility in Thailand

Here’s a campaign worthy of support. Josh Kearns has a long history of good work in Thailand. This is a very well presented pitch…

https://experiment.com/projects/can-biomass-char-remove-toxic-synthetic-chemicals-from-drinking-water

“Toxic synthetic chemicals such as pesticides and pharmaceutical residues are a major threat to drinking water safety worldwide. Low-cost, environmentally sustainable and locally managed treatment technologies are needed to protect human health in impoverished, rural and remote communities. This research project demonstrates the potential of char made from surplus biomass (biochar) as an effective sorbent for chemical toxins.”

Auckland University biochar publication

I’ve just discovered this new publication which is listed here…

http://www.publish.csiro.au/view/journals/dsp_journal_crossref_cites.cfm?nid=84&f=SR10004

Chapter 25 – Advances and Innovations in Biochar Production and Utilization for Improving Environmental Quality

Abstract

Biochar is a contextually defined charcoal specifically for application to soil, and further improvement of biochar efficacy will progress in response to the ongoing refinement of its intended specific uses. The environmental impacts and agronomic limitations that agriculture is simultaneously responsible for and constrained by are equal in diversity to the characteristics required of customized biochars to address these issues. Considering the broad diversity of biochar qualities existent across all potential feedstocks and pyrolysis conditions, the spectrum of chemical, physical, and biological environmental goals achievable through the employment of biochars, may be many fold greater. While much of the current research focus within the relatively new field of biochar has been on classifying biochar properties and observing plant responses from conventional field trials, the true potential of biochar will not be realized until researchers refine the process of pairing these biochars with soils in a thoroughly well understood and systematic way in order to address the spatially and temporally variable specific environmental impacts and agronomic limitations that are present. Just as it took many generations for researchers to fully understand the interactions of uncharred organic amendments with soils across the world, it will take time to fully realize the potential of biochar in agriculture. The custom design and targeted use of biochar is the current forefront.

Missed MPI funding opportunity?

The Sustainable Land Management and Climate Change (SLMACC) research programme…

http://www.mpi.govt.nz/environment-natural-resources/funding-programmes/slmacc-research-programme

Theme 2: Mitigation of agricultural and forestry greenhouse gas (GHG) emissions

Theme 2 specifically lists biochar and soil carbon as appropriate research themes. I have an inquiry placed with MPI to see if any funding was picked up for biochar research. Will keep you posted on this.

I’m putting together lists on research project ideas and funding sources. I plan to provide links to the lists via ABE. Please get in touch if you can assist or want to collaborate.

Previous posts under the Funding tag… https://soilcarbon.org.nz/tag/funding/

Applied research in Victoria, Oz

More applied research examples from Australia,

“The North East CMA has been working with a range of partners to develop a mobile pyrolysis plant which can turn woody waste into Biochar, which can then be used for agricultural production. The CMA has also undertaken a range of trials of Biochar in the region to test how this works in an agricultural production system.”

Thanks to Frank Strie at Terra-Preta Developments in Tasmania (http://www.abc.net.au/news/2013-11-22/agribusiness-biochar-tas/5111096) for pointing to this work. Frank has commented on their use of ‘raw’ char…

...”So far just as in Tassie, fresh, ‘pure char’ researched without charging /composting it first with nutrients etc. …

  1. This may change…   
    I think if we would try to compare brand new, high quality car & tractor batteries installed in good equipment without charging them first, 
    we would be just as disappointed with the performance.  Or not? 
    One crucial point that needs to be realized around the world, to make it economical and optimum effective, the cascading use of char is the way forward.

    Without the change to cascading use of char (like filter char – come biochar) www.ithaka-journal.net/55-anwendungen-von-pflanzenkohle?lang=en View shared post

Hans-Peter Schmidt – Dec 29, 2012″

New research from NZ

New biochar paper based on research from Massey University…

Stabilizing Chromium from Leather Waste in Biochar

“Disposal of chrome-tanned leather waste provides an environmental challenge, with land-based methods risking leaching of chromium into the environment. We investigate the production of biochar from leather as an alternative means to dispose of leather waste. Chrome-tanned leather is heated at 500–1000 °C in an environment excluding oxygen to form biochar. The char is leached in 1 M HCl for 15 h, and the leachate is analyzed for Cr to confirm that Cr does not leach from char formed at or above 600 °C. The char is analyzed by X-ray absorption spectroscopy (XAS) for chemical state and structure. X-ray absorption near edge structure (XANES) analysis shows that the leather and biochar contain Cr as a mixture of Cr sulfate and Cr carbide, with the proportion of Cr as carbide increasing from 0% for untreated leather to 88% for char formed at 1000 °C. Modeling of the extended X-ray absorption fine structure (EXAFS) spectra shows that the atomic near-range structure is consistent with that of chromium carbide for the high-temperature samples. Biochar produced from chrome-tanned leather waste contains highly dispersed chromium present as a stable, carbide-like structure (provided sufficiently high temperatures are used). This material, rather than being an environmental problem, may be used for soil remediation and carbon sequestration.”

Hannah C. Wells, Katie H. Sizeland, Richard L. Edmonds, William Aitkenhead, Peter Kappen§, Chris Glover§, Bernt Johannessen§, and Richard G. Haverkamp*
School of Engineering and Advanced Technology, Massey University, Private Bag 11222, Palmerston North 4442, New Zealand
Leather and Shoe Research Association, P.O. Box 8094, Palmerston North 4446, New Zealand
§ Australian Synchrotron, 800 Blackburn Road, Clayton, Victoria 3168, Australia

Why alum, not biochar?

Ballance hits half way in product innovation programme

… “One example of a product concept which hasn’t made it to the next round was the potential of alum to mitigate phosphorus runoff losses from pastures to waterways.

“It is used successfully in water treatment, but for mitigation of phosphorus runoff the effective rates proved to be cost prohibitive.”

Nearly $20M for conventional fertiliser research but no room for biochar trials in NZ?

http://www.scoop.co.nz/stories/BU1406/S00307/ballance-hits-half-way-in-product-innovation-programme.htm

Mullumbimby 5-7 Sept.2014

http://www.bio-charfest.org/index.html

“Bio-char Fest is in it’s second year after a successful launch last year at the Mullumbimby community Gardens Living Earth Festival where over 6000 people attended the day. This year the event aims to link the Bio-char, Carbon Farming (Hemp & Bamboo) & 3D printing industries with the view of capturing carbon in our soils, housing, consumer products and thus being one of the solutions to global warming whilst developing a more sustainable economy.”

This looks like a great event that I’m sure would welcome a kiwi delegation. Only a short trip down from the Gold Coast.

Mike Barton on N-capping

The following link has a 40min presentation from Mike Barton that is recommended viewing if you are interested in how nutrient capping may affect future agriculture activities in NZ.

http://beeflambnz.com/news-events/News/2013/july/farming-with-nutrient-limits/

An important biochar related take from this presentation is how Overseer may be an impediment to future biochar application activities. It may be vital for biochar proponents to get collaborative research activity under way with regard to Overseer.  I have previously discussed Overseer here.Overseer

I suggested in an earlier post that an economic driver for biochar in NZ may be in nutrient management. One important economic issue I did not address was the potential for biochar to support or enhance land values by buffering the pressures between nutrient management and water quality. You can see from Mike’s presentation that nutrient caps are already dictating land values in the Taupo catchment. If biochar efficacy can be recognised by overseer in the future it will open doors to a range of application scenarios.

Mike’s story on farming under Taupo N-capping was recently the focus of Country Calender… http://tvnz.co.nz/country-calendar/episode-2-nitrogen-bomb-5380543