Bamboo

The Charming Bamboo Charcoal in Taiwan
Taipei Municipal Daan Vocational Industrial High School, Taipei, Taiwan, Taiwan, Cyberfair 2008, February 2008

Bamboo Charcoal Fertilized Vegetables

The Care for the Environment

The Project

Description of Our Community

In this community there are consumers like us who are interested in environment-friendly products, local business people who are trying to make use of natural resources, and research institutes who are helping make the economy and the environment better. Our project hopes to connect these three kinds of people so that we can know each other better and care more about our environment.

Summary of Our Project

Our project is about bamboo charcoal, its characteristics and functions in terms of environmental protection and applications to daily life. With its high utility, it is seen as a valuable natural resource for our future life.

Biochar Trial Photos

Empty Planting Trays on Rack	Fine Wet Processed Charcoal Settling in Flask	Bamboo Feedstock	Softwood Chip Feedstock
Charcoal Production in Woodgas Stoves	Charcoal Grades	Char Measurement
Amended Pots Prior to Mixing	Pots Mixed and Seeds Sown	Growth After 9 Days	Wheat and Peas Seperated to Avoid Shading

Some design features below:
Exploring interaction effects of feedstock type, soil, char application
rate, crop species, char size, fertilization, and mycorrhizal fungi.
No repetition (n=1), this loses the ability to assign a statistical
significance level to results, but allows more interactions (96 unique
combinations, 96 pots) to be tried given limited resources.

Charcoal produced in WoodGas stoves.
Char yield 12-18% (char mass/air dry biomass mass) (ie not adjusted to conventional dry weight yield unit, yet).
Fine Char - Blended and sieved to 230 mesh (<63 micron).
Coarse Char - Blended and sieved to between ~24 mesh - 8 mesh.
Fertilizer - 4-4-4 NPK Organic (bone meal, feather meal...)
Potting Soil - Potting Mix
Sandy Soil - Mixture of Horticultural Sand and Sandy Loam from Central Valley

Pots arranged in random spatial order (to randomize light/watering variation). Trays rotated to limit effects of light/watering variation.
Automatic drip emitter watering. Pots grown in enclosed cage outdoors.

Blocks - ( 8 pots/block)
    Fertilizer {Yes,No}
    Plant {Wheat, Pea}
    Soil {Sandy, Potting}

Blocks - (12 blocks * 8 pots/block = 96 pots)
    B1 -    Char (0 g)
    B2 -    Char (1 g, Pine, Fine)
    B3 -    Char (1 g, Pine, Coarse)
    B4 -    Char (1 g, Bamboo, Fine)
    B5 -    Char (1 g, Bamboo, Coarse)
    B6 -    Char (5 g, Pine, Fine)
    B7 -    Char (5 g, Pine, Coarse)
    B8 -    Char (5 g, Bamboo, Fine)
    B9 -    Char (5 g, Bamboo, Coarse)
    B10 -   Char (0 g) + Mycorrhizae
    B11 -   Char (5 g, Pine, Coarse) + Mycorrhizae
    B12 -   Char (10 g, Pine, Coarse)
 

Bamboo-based Charcoal Production
National Mission on Bamboo Applications, InfoSheet IS 03 09/05, India

Charcoal made from bamboo finds ready uses and markets. It has been made for thousands of years in pits and even shallow depressions. Specially designed brick kilns, developed and tested by the National Mission on Bamboo Applications (NMBA), provide an opportunity to make high-quality charcoal from bamboo in an efficient, safe and reliable manner.

National Mission on Bamboo Applications (NMBA)
Vishwakarma Bhawan, Shaheed Jeet Singh Marg
New Delhi 110 016, India
Telephone 91-11-26566778 Fax 91-11-26962267
Email bamboo@bambootech.org
Website www.bambootech.org

How to Make Charcoal
Robert Flanagan, SAFFE, January 30, 2008

I've just been playing around with my natural draft stove to see how easy it would be to use it for cooking and making charcoal http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Y5OAkmum7gU&feature=channel_page .
I fed some extra fuel in the side so show the pyrolysis reaction taking place.

Bamboo Biochar Trial 2006 China
Robert Flanagan, SAFFE, China, July 2007

This is a trial we started last year using bamboo charcoal as a soil amendment. Last year we sent Cornell University soil samples last year and hope to continue this research with them in the future.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=_7-cq_w1VVY

Growth Promotion of Tea Trees by Putting Bamboo Charcoal in Soil
Takehiko Hoshi, Department of Biological Science and Technology, School of High-Technology for human Welfare, Tokai University, Shizuoka, Japan 2001

Summary

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

Abstract