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  • From: "Scott Pittman" <scott@permaculture.org>
  • To: "'permaculture'" <permaculture@lists.ibiblio.org>
  • Subject: Re: [permaculture] Carbon farming as solution to climate change?
  • Date: Sat, 1 May 2010 10:44:23 -0500

If you get a chance check out "The Biochar Debate" by James Bruges, he gives
many examples of small farmers in India who make their own biochar for their
fields as well as extra for sale.

It is one of the best books I have read on biochar that is reasoned and
sensible. He is not a fan of turning biochar into a commodity of carbon
credits run by the world trade organizaions.

Scott Pittman
Director
Permaculture Institute
www.permaculture.org
-----Original Message-----
From: permaculture-bounces@lists.ibiblio.org
[mailto:permaculture-bounces@lists.ibiblio.org] On Behalf Of Holger
Hieronimi
Sent: Thursday, April 29, 2010 4:58 PM
To: permaculture
Subject: Re: [permaculture] Carbon farming as solution to climate change?

Hola-

thank you, Darren, Rain, Mich and all the others for this valuable info

Your recent posts on this topic clarified a lot - looks like more than
just an introductory course on Carbon Farming to me

I will have to get through this info with time - and have to see what we
can apply in our work with local campesinos
seems that we have to downscale this a little bit...most of the people
I´m workin with, have access to much smaller pieces of land (2 to 7 ha.)

During the last five years we told people to add charcoral to their
(bocashi-)compost.
Sebastiao Piñedo sais in his courses with campesinos, that charcoral
works like a "battery"...sounds funny, but it makes no sense to explain
complex issues on soil microbiology in too scientific language. We have
to invent another language for this contexts...

Question: Is there any spanish info available on Carbon Farming ???

Thanks also to the owners and operators of this list, in the current
information storm, most of the posts that I receive are really valuable
adds to my practice as PC desiner and teacher.

saludos

Holger Hieronimi



El 13:59, Darren Doherty escribió:
> G'day, We are working with a couple of companies....one is a San
> Francisco-based BioChar/Solar Power VC (that I met with last year) and one
> of their partners here in Australia who have developed a char mineral
> complex that low temperature chars stuff like chicken manure (yes from
> industrial chicken factories), municipal woody waste and clays to make a
> pretty amazing product that according to much of the analysis done so far
in
> field testing does a great job of increasing CEC, water holding and
> biological activity very quickly in all soil types including the sands of
> the grain belt in Western Australia. So yes I think that this material has
> great potential but then so does harvesting sunlight, air and water in a
> great process called photosynthesis and using it to restore carbon (via
root
> exudates and the soil food web) into even very sandy soils and using this
as
> the extensive soil amendment therapy before we hit the input button,
whether
> its soil inversion subsoiler plows that bring clays to the surface in
duplex
> soils (ie with sand over clay) or biochar or anything else brought in from
> outside of the site. The local developers assure me that the full life
cycle
> analysis of this product on this is on the money, though I have yet to see
> the this in print as such.
>
> At a product level its very good, though again my Permaculture emergy and
> Keyline 'Sun:Air:Water' strings as the only ideal inputs are always pulled
> when working with any external input. Get over it but get over it mindful
of
> the greater potential especially where this example of GreenTech is also
> able to generate electricity and hot water and water itself (capture of
the
> water coming from the char process) and is using materials that are
> available locally abundant and are otherwise polluting (ie chicken
wastes),
> excess to quarrying and mass prunings of municipalities. Certainly any
kind
> of GreenTech is easy to take pot shots at from a Permaculture perspective,
> though in my opinion at the R&D level this only serves to negate
potentials
> to innovate and develop ready alternatives to the status quo of urban food
> production, distribution and resource depletion. Of course we would love
to
> see that urban sprawl over farming land stops and that everyone produces
as
> much as they can for themselves, but there is always going to be a place
in
> the division of services for concentrated food production of different
> scales in urban areas.
>
> I have recently designed a R&D farm for this company where we integrated
the
> char facility with 2400m2 of hothouses. Separated by only 20 metres these
> two facilities work together quite well and are a great example of the
> design process we in PC know as 'Random Assembly' and inspired a lot by
the
> works of Dr. George Chan and Will Allen. So taking that excess hot water
we
> then use it to heat water tanks for tropical aquaculture production, from
> which we then use the water from the fish tanks to go to irrigate a
> aquaponic vegetable system inspired by Will Allen's 'Growing Power' system
> of soil hydroponics (as opposed to the typical soil-less systems), where
the
> water from the fish tanks is fertigated via either drip or spray
irrigation
> over veges grown in pots filled with compost and this char mineral complex
> and then this water goes back to the fish tanks or is used to irrigate
field
> crops that are a feedstock for the fish systems after having gone through
a
> system of adjacent wetlands prior to being used for irrigation of the
field
> crops. The production figures and cash flow from this system is pretty
> amazing and we already have checked in with a local food distribution
> aggregator who would take whatever we have and distribute it within an
hour
> of the system.
>
> Again on the broader question of Carbon Farming the use of the
Permaculture
> Ethics and Principles come into clear play as do, in my opinion, the
> Holistic Management 'Testing Decisions'. When we apply these parameters to
> some of Allan Yeomans (and others) ideas on a nuclear:organically farmed
> biofuels paradise with no need to reduce our 'standard of living' such
that
> its more or less the same with no limits to growth etc. (as William
> McDonough states is only a limited by design and its expression in design
> abundance etc.) then they are probably looking pretty shaky, particularly
> when it comes to Nuclear energy (assuming Allan is correct in saying it
> actually relatively safe and that we could use subduction zones to dispose
> of the relatively small volume of high level waste) as it has to be
massive,
> and centralised in control. Clearly that model of anything is not getting
us
> anywhere and has to be a focal point of change.
>
> Localised biofuel production has demonstrated potential as does localised
> pyrolysis energy production with its outputs of electricity, syngas (wood
> gas), industrially refined products, hot water and char using the
feedstock
> of local waste streams and perpetual coppice and return of char to the
local
> agricultural systems. Vandana Shiva's 'Soil not Oil' speaks well to the
> potential of the explosion of the non-localised, greenwashed model of
these
> systems and how important it is to be as localised as possible to which I
> would ally my view.
>
> Enough for now: gotta work to pay for the car to get to work to pay for
> house and the land and blah blah blah...
>
> All the best,
>
> Darren
>






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