Properties

Gardening with Biochar FAQ (Wiki)
Philip Small, May 21, 2008

Welcome to a Gardening with Biochar FAQ!
... a work in progress...

When gardeners add biochar to garden soil, we are, in effect attempting to follow in the footsteps of the originators of Terra Preta. Because we don't know exactly how that process worked, nor how we can best adapt it outside its area of origin, we are left to discover much of this by experimenting with our own gardens and comparing observations within our own communities.

See:

Gardening with Biochar FAQ (Wiki)

Soil Analysis: Interpreting a Soil Test for lawns
John R. Street, Maurice E. Watson, William E. Pound, Ohio State University Extension Fact Sheet, HYG-4028

Factsheet. This publication will help you interpret the recommendations provided by The Ohio State University's soil testing laboratory. The facility is termed the Research Extension Analytical Lab (R.E.A.L.) and is an important facility for testing lawn soils.

Training Manual of Bamboo Charcoal for Producers and Consumers
JIANG Shenxue, Bamboo Engineering Research Center, Nanjing Forestry University, May 2004

Abstract

Chemical Analysis: Testing of Barbecue Coal and Barbecue Briquettes
Force Technology, Denmark

Force Technology lists and compares Danish standards with European test methods.

Dear friends: terra preta is fascinating in part because it involves so many disciplines. My viewpoint is that of a fuel scientist/chemical engineer.

My laboratory produces well-characterized charcoals for a wide variety of research endeavors, including carbon fuel cell studies, metallurgical charcoal applications, activated carbon production, and terra preta research (with my colleagues Dr. Goro Uehara, Dr. Jonathan Deenik, and Tai McClellan in the University of Hawaii’s College of Tropical Agriculture and Human Resources). With this message I wish to call your attention to the elementary properties of charcoal that I think about when I am producing a charcoal for one of our research endeavors.

Both the feedstock and the process (i.e. pyrolysis) conditions influence the properties of the charcoal product. For example, oak wood has little ash; consequently its charcoal also has little ash. On the other hand, rice hulls have much ash (nearly pure silica), and so does its charcoal.