A primer in Biochar

Four weeks ago, a friend, Efraín, gave me a present: four sacks of compost. I applied two of these sacks to my front garden. The results were terrific:

Consider that February is not the best month for gardens (in Mexico). I don’t have a BEFORE image of my garden, but it was in a sad condition, so you have to take my word for it.?

My gardener was impressed and told me that one neighbor had asked him how I got these results. Joking around with him, I said I sang all week to my garden. In the end, I gave him a sack of compost, and he is now asking for more to meet a growing demand.?

Talking with Efrain, I learned that this particular compost was turbocharged with Biochar. Efrain also provided me with comprehensive documents about this topic; my objective for this text is to provide a straightforward introduction to Biochar.?

Biochar provides an efficient way to capture nutrients and water. You can conceptualize Biochar as a sponge, a container for beneficial elements for the crops. The important part is how to enrich the soils by adding other nutrients to biochar. In the case of my garden, the beneficial microorganisms of the compost found a suitable environment to grow.?

The general functions of Biochar are as a soil improver, global warming mitigator, energy generator, and waste management. As mentioned, it affects the soil quality, a moisture retainer, and microbial habitat. Biochar also enables carbon sequestration; the carbon is captured in the soil rather than in the air.

Pyrolysis is a thermal decomposition in the absence of oxygen; it is different from combustion, where we have heat, fuel, and oxygen. To create this carbonate compound, we keep the fuel (the vegetal biomass) and the heat (300 and 900 degrees Celsius). This process generates chemical changes in the structure of carbonated compounds resulting in a very pure form of carbon.?

Is Biochar available in ample supplies? Is it possible to get this product to improve your crops?

The answer is yes. I visited one of the locations of Efrain’s operation. In this picture, you see one of the dozens of compost piles. Some of these piles have a mixture of Biochar and compost.?

Biomass created by the sugar cane industry continuously arrives at the location. As a result, there are thousands of tons of compost.

Consider the recent increase in the price of traditional, chemical-based agro-inputs. Can the mixture of compost and Biochar be leveraged to boost production?

Can Biochar help us in our quest for food sovereignty? The results on my front garden were excellent. Now, I started the discussion with my partner César Salgado Venegas to understand how we can increase our capabilities to disperse biochar/compost at scale.?

Thoughts?