What is Biochar?

Biochar was used as early as 2,500 years ago to enhance poor quality agricultural soils by the people of the Amazon Basin. It’s commonly known as Terr-Preta or “dark earth”. Biochar is derived from variety of organic materials that have been heated to high temperatures at low oxygen levels in a process known as pyrolysis. The pyrolysis process creates a fine-grained, highly porous charcoal-like material, rich in carbon and extremely resistant to decomposition.

The porous structure has an extraordinary amount of surface area making it a highly adsorbent material as outlined as the surface has a variable charge which increases cation exchange capacity ( surface sorption capacity).

Biochar is a versatile and reliable filter media that can sequester carbon in soil and reduce greenhouse gases through sequestration, in fact biochar derived from wood remains stable in the ground for over 1,000 years, making it an ideal media for carbon sequestration. Modern pyrolysis systems burn wood or other organic waste to create biochar with different properties based on the feedstock and burning system used.

What can Biochar be Used For?

1. Reclamation and Remediation: Biochar can be used for reclamation and remediation of polluted soils through the absorption of contaminants, making them unavailable to organisms (Koul, B. & Taak, P., 2018). Biochar acts as a low-cost bioabsorbant that can remove potentially toxic chemicals from water. Examples: Mining remediation, wastewater treatment, urban stormwater runoff, removal of toxic chemicals from sewage sludge, landfill remediation.

2. Hydro-fracking: Biochar can be used to increase soil restoration (biochar increases the ability of soil to immobilize harmful heavy metals which are toxic to plants) and ecosystem services such as improved water quality, wildlife forage and Carbon sequestration.

3. Carbon Sequestration: 1 Mt of dry biomass sequesters (locks away) 0.3 MT of carbon, equivalent to 1.2 MT CO2. Biochar as a soil additive can provide a potential carbon sink for Carbon and reduce Cos release back into the atmosphere.

4. Sustainable Alternative for Coke/Coal Replacement in Steel: Luxmet, a corporation that works to bring efficiencies to the metals industry, states that “as a renewable fuel source, biochar produced from waste biomass is gaining interest as an alternative to coal and coke in steelmaking. Thus far the results of researchers and industries have shown that biochar has the potential to find its place in coking, sintering, metalized pallets production and as a carbon source in Blast Furnace (BF) processes and Electric Arc Furnaces (EAF) processes.”

5. Agricultural Leaching: The use of biochar as a soil amendment not only serves to improve soil quality and sequester carbon but holds a significant role in preventing downstream damage to water bodies.

What will Northern Biochar Systems be processing?

Northern Biochar Systems will be processing residual timber harvest waste using a pyrolysis system to produce biochar products that can be utilized for:

• Carbon sequestration

• Waste elimination – industrial and urban filtration systems

• Forest resilience – enhancing degraded soils

• Improving growing conditions for – agriculture, horticulture, reclamation, and remediation

• Filtration media – industrial runoff and wastewater, urban drainage

• Provision of a natural and sustainable carbon source for coke and metals use

Our biochar is manufactured from residual forestry waste collected from tree harvest operations on Nisga’a Territories in Northwest British Columbia.