I've been making biochar from woodchips delivered free from chipdrop using a 55 gallon drum and 30 gallon drum, then soaking in chicken manure, grass clippings, LAB, leaf mold and compost tea combination (worm castings).
@snookmeister55Ай бұрын
Lots of work but interesting work, 55/30 with an Afterburner.
@ohio_gardener11 ай бұрын
I've been using Biochar for years in my raised garden beds, and it has made a tremendous improvement in the health of the plants and an increase in production. I have recently experimented with pulverizing Royal Oak Lump Charcoal and activating it to make more Biochar, and it appears to be working great.
@thetruemorg Жыл бұрын
In so many ways there is so much waste wood that I see in rural Oregon. I'm slowly moving to do homesteading sort of stuff and something useful like this kiln would be a fantastic way to deal with overgrown land I've seen. Really great video
@chickenhawkfarmstead8478 Жыл бұрын
Been making lots of this with a 55 gallon metal drum. No mods need just got to keep feeding it. Biochar is great stuff
@MeanOldLadyАй бұрын
I basically turn mine into terra preta pits when I want a new garden spot. We dig out a good-sized pit, usually around 10x10 or 10x20 & fill it full of logs, sticks, free wood chips & broken pots if we've got 'em & burn everything & quench with dirt & fire. We'll do this a couple times a year until it's full & weathers the winter, then we plant in it come spring.
@liznyp6209 Жыл бұрын
We’ve made it and didn’t realize lol. We do a burn pile once in a while and get tired waiting for it all to burn to ash. We hose down the pile to put it out and are left with chunks of bio char. I have put some in the garden but didn’t know how much I could use because I also put ash from the woodstove in there too.
@jamesstidham41912 ай бұрын
I'm a firm believer in bio char I make it myself. I believe it can be used to slow down the loss of topsoil which leads to the land turning to desert. Myself I use the pit method I can make a hundred gallons per burn, a burn takes me about 3 hours and I let my chickens activate for me . do have a bless day.
@itsno1duh Жыл бұрын
I was in the Yahoo biochar group with Kelpie back in the day (still am just not active) Love her device! Always improvising! I mostly do leave burning with a biochar focus. Small piles , burn fast, turn a bit and douse. They immediately attract a halo of tiny flying creatures as if an energy magnet! At the end of season I had charred all day but put out the last 3 piles halfburned. Come spring all the charred to completion piles were still loose usable chips of char! great but I happened to kick one of the half burned piles and it was solid, consumed by mycellium and was glued to the woodland floor! All three were like that. My brain said WOW! THAT is what I want! No smoky smoldering piles just fast burn half done WIN_WIN!
@michaelgreenlee94318 ай бұрын
I made a "Fire Ring Kiln" 3'w x 30"h. It worked great. I made about 2/3 of a cubic yard of char in about 3 hours. I had to run the water hose on it for at least 20 min to cool it off.
@snookmeister55Ай бұрын
Steam activation increases surface area while you douse.
@cekfraun Жыл бұрын
Very interesting video, Troy. I keep hearing about biochar, and have even watched Ben Hollar making biochar on his homestead, but I didn't really understand much about it. Thanks for all of this valuable information!
@lovingit1538 Жыл бұрын
Great video. Ty.
@jbbrown7907 Жыл бұрын
You are sharing all my secrets. Biochar is the best thing since sliced bread on the homestead.
@tradermunky1998 Жыл бұрын
Super cool!
@jeffrobodine239 Жыл бұрын
You can also grow mushrooms like oyster, shiitake, reishi ect.
@jimputnam2044 Жыл бұрын
Would not chipping and spreading with the manure from your farm not do the same thing. No fire no smoke no carbon released into the air? just wood chips rotting and releasing carbon over time into soil?
@mbailey123416 ай бұрын
That’s going to be more of a “brown carbon” that will just break down over time. The biochar is going to stay put much longer. The brown carbon would still be better than nothing though although it is temporary
@alexkerpe930 Жыл бұрын
I not understand the cylindrical system for making the char. MOst of the time you see the cone shape system where you add layer after layer so the layer at 5he lowest not get ir anymore or the retort system. First time i see this one here and would like to know something like efficiency comparrison. Because this one shown here looks very practical. But as i understand you put everything in from the beginning? That would mean the pile wil burn all the way to the lowest zone?
@koltoncrane30995 ай бұрын
From a pure efficiency perspective skillcult channel did like a six foot trench by four feet wide. Ya add a layer of logs and burn and when its coals ya add another layer of logs until the trench is filled to the top. Then dowse it with water or cover with metal and dirt to put out the oxygen. I’ve done the trench method and burned a large load of wood on a 20 foot trailer. I loaded the trailer up maybe four feet with logs, branches etc and burned in a trench for six hours maybe haha maybe eight. Then I soaked all the charcoal in a large like ten foot round horse water trough. That’s been the most effective method I’ve seen that’s cheap. You could make a large metal tank 30 foot long and then burn natural gas or something and do bulk production. If ya got the money you could just make activated carbon while you’re at it.
@mrbisse17 ай бұрын
Well done! Nice and clear. Also on the part of your interviewee.
@aspendell209 Жыл бұрын
I am familiar with making charcoal for fuel. It requires an aenerobic (sealed) chamber for the wood chunks which is then heated from the outside turning it to charcoal and not releasing the gasses and other pollutants into the air. The biochar methods you are referring to seem to just burn the wood in an open pit, exposed to the air (for combustion), and hence releasing all those valuable distillates and gasses from the combustion process into the air. Since you lose all the combustibles from the char, it wouldn't be useful as say BBQ charcoal. But it seems to me that the process of creating the biochar releases as many harmful gasses into the atmosphere as it potentially saves later making it a zero-sum gain. Can you speak to this?
@RedToolHouse Жыл бұрын
You are core t about the crucible method. That is how I make lump coal for my smoker. The theory behind Biochar production in this manner is that waste wood allow to decay in the forest releases 95% of its carbon. Pyrolysis converts some of the wood into active carbon that takes much longer to break down. Biochar suspends carbon release. The wood waste needs to be under 25% moisture content so methane is not released during the burn.
@jimputnam2044 Жыл бұрын
My thoughts exactly. Chip it and mix with compost and spread it all the carbon is in the soil.
@FelonyVideos Жыл бұрын
The key here is that the carbon itself is captured and used as a matrix directly in the soil. Composting eventually releases all of the carbon as CO2. (I'm not a greenhouse gas weirdo, and I know climate scientists are lying through their teeth, but chemistry is chemistry, whether you believe the "other" lies or not). When carbon is captured as C2, it stays that way a very long time (hundreds of years), unless you reheat it to many hundreds of degrees to force it to convert to CO2 and CO. That never happens in your garden. In the meantime, pure carbon acts like a perfectly Ph-neutral sponge/matrix that allows all the other great stuff to have a massive microscopic platform to grow on - even water loves to fill in all the many gaps in the carbon and just stay there, slowly releasing as the garden dries out during drought. Much of the carbon retains the original mechanical matrix of the original wood - all the micro-tubules that are in a tree trunk or limb (or even leaf) - you can imagine the water-holding capacity of that structure. And the carbon is so chemically neutral and passive at normal temperatures that it basically has no other effect on your garden chemistry - it doesn't react with and suck out all your existing NPK and other minerals. Well, it does absorb some of them until it reaches it's own saturation level and then stops absorbing, but it doesn't act like a catalyst, continually eating away at the good stuff in your soil. It's some beautiful stuff, and this is coming from a climate-denier, so consider that, too. It's not a scam by the nature freaks, or else I would be railing against it as garbage science. This is the real deal. The South American Indians/Aztecs/Amazons called it Terra Preta (Pretty Earth?).
@itsno1duh Жыл бұрын
There are times and place for the pefectly pyrolised burn but there trully is so much wood trimming out there that it's not possible logistically to get it to a retort and it ends up fire hazard and/or rotting waste. A properly made fire is still pretty air tight with practice and knowledge... When possible a proper retort allows energy utilization and a more directed burn quality but you will find many different settings where this type fire initiates earthlings into making their own char very similar to the great South American communities! Combining char with a community's humanure was probably the catalyst for terre pretta... MHO
@sumakwelvictoria5635 Жыл бұрын
When you burn wood about 40 to 50% is turned into biochar. It releases 50 to 60% carbon dioxide into the atmosphere. When biochar is mixed with compost and it matures. It starts collecting carbon and oxygen and other gases from the atmosphere. It slows down the complete decomposition of organic matter to at least a decade or more. So the tendency is that it keeps on collecting carbon mass and builds up soil with a lot of carbon. Every year it traps more than 50 to above 100% in carbon. In a decade it can exceed more than a 1000% of carbon sequestration. That is nigh permanent carbon sequestration.
@StonerSmurfin8 ай бұрын
@RedToolHouse you don't just have to sell it as biochar. It's lump charcoal, so you can also sell in bags for people to use in their grill for cooking during the summer. Lump charcoal is a huge seller and better than those little charcoal briquettes when it comes to flavor on the finished product.
@integrityboerboelkennels3521 Жыл бұрын
Troy you asked the question of," how the government maybe involved?" Well here in Fayetteville, NC if you are burning on your property, the County Code Enforcement, the NC DEQ and the EPA all comes out. They ask questions about the material being burned, if it came from your land or brought in from somewhere else. If you brought it in this where the fines begin. Burning debris from another site is illegal. Then they would have you take it to County Landfill and pay to have it disposed of. They will chip and turn it to compost then sell it back to the public.
@seesafar9912 Жыл бұрын
Be careful with any "Waste" product. Heavy metals were found in some types of char, any "Char". Check for heavy metals in the "Char" product before use.
@priayief4 ай бұрын
Am I supposed to believe that using biochar in my healthy garden soil will improve my vegetable production significantly? I have yet to see or hear of a peer-reviewed trial that shows this. I'm not interested in the theory, I'm interested in the results.
@angelgarcia4848 Жыл бұрын
Not all chars are equal. Depending on the stock used to make chad it could have a greater or worse affect then other chars. For instance char made from sugar cane stocks has been shown to be the most promising for cherry trees but less effective from just simple wood chars. Also the process of making char is called pyrolysis. It’s basically depriving oxygen to your stock till it crystallizes in texture.
@itsno1duh Жыл бұрын
It is a broad and exciting science once the potential is properly assessed.
@sunnys37279 ай бұрын
thats snake oil
@angelgarcia48489 ай бұрын
@@sunnys3727 take it up with the empirical research, I’m not the scientist.
@johnjdumas4 ай бұрын
It is holes. It absorbs buffers and then slow releases water and nutrients but has none of its own. Similar to Hugelkulture. It is like a capacitor in an electronic circuit.
@johnjdumas4 ай бұрын
I could regularly water and fertilize my tomatoes because tomatoes HATE irregular care. 5% biochar buffers irregularities and makes me look like I know what I am doing! Put it in with compost to let the volatiles evaporate and the bacteria establish.
@bret354 Жыл бұрын
usually, biochar is made by heating wood in the absence of air.
@RedToolHouse Жыл бұрын
Crucible method is one way of producing Biochar. That is the process I use to make lump coal for the smoker
@stephenmccoy372 Жыл бұрын
Hey Troy, what is the NRCS? We are an up and coming farm with a mill a couple hours on up in the state from ya. This would way better than just burning or chipping the slats!
@RedToolHouse Жыл бұрын
Link is in the video description. It is the National Resources Conservation Service. Ya'll up near Motown?
@johnthomas5806 Жыл бұрын
thanks for this information
@HoffAppFarm9 ай бұрын
Stellar!
@davidkirkman2223 Жыл бұрын
So my question is wood that does not burn completely ( the black charcoal looking stuff) would that be biochar?
@bret354 Жыл бұрын
yes
@RedToolHouse Жыл бұрын
Yes, the charcoal is the beginning of it. It is Biochar once you put it with nutrients (manure, compost, etc). Ideally, you want all charcoal and not some charcoal on the end of a piece of wood. That is why a complete burn is needed but not taken to ash
@davidkirkman2223 Жыл бұрын
For some reason my wood stove does not burn all wood to ashes and I get about 1/6 char and 5/6 ashes, now I can not sift and through
@robertrutter1048 Жыл бұрын
If you use a outdoor boiler you have access to biochar.
@andrewsusen3154 Жыл бұрын
Whats the difference between biochar and campfire waste?
@RedToolHouse Жыл бұрын
Nothing really. If you have a good burn on wood that is turned to charcoal, it is the same thing. Campfires tend to burn to ash or burn one end to charcoal and the other is still wood, but you can find good charcoal from a fire that has burned out or was quenched.
@cekfraun Жыл бұрын
@@RedToolHouse That's good to know. I am going to start adding the char left from our outdoor fires up at the lake into my raised garden beds there. Yay!
@BS.-.- Жыл бұрын
There making biochar out of pallets?
@zanepaxton7452 Жыл бұрын
Yes, but it’s potentially toxic depending on how it’s treated, or not. There’s a 2 letter code stamped on them; “HT” is Heat Treated” which is fine. Canada doesn’t allow any chemical treatment of pallets.
@andyjoubert94106 ай бұрын
Making biochar increases CO2 in the 1st place so?
@22fingers3 ай бұрын
but it locks carbon in the ground you can also produce syngas very climate friendly , i was always taught you garden matter should increase year on year instead of decrease like it does using mineral fertilizers
@TheSmagzilla Жыл бұрын
What's biochar worth in 1lb bag or 5 lb bag
@RedToolHouse Жыл бұрын
Last time a checked a cubic yard of Biochar was $125
@snookmeister55Ай бұрын
Too bad the word activated is being used in reference to charging with nutrients. Activated charcoal and charged charcoal have different definitions, except in biochar world.
@showaltermicro Жыл бұрын
carbon credits came from ENRON
@bettinaripperger41594 ай бұрын
And we know how their accounting system is
@charlescoker77525 ай бұрын
Misleading. That chunk of of Charcoal you are holding, only becomes biochar after it has absorbed the microbes, and other organic fertilizers. Someone may put what they think is biochar, and end up tying up the fertilizer for 3 years.
@22fingers3 ай бұрын
and if that someone tried to blame a single youtube video they watched for teaching them wrong i would laugh very loudly at them
@ryankremer9832 Жыл бұрын
Isn’t this just about making charcoal and skipping over the biological aspects that make it “bio?” Can’t sell this product as biochar until its inoculated with life somehow, right?
@RedToolHouse Жыл бұрын
Yes. Which we talk about that in the video
@RichSobocinski Жыл бұрын
Carbon credits are a scam
@stevecobb7844 Жыл бұрын
Can you explain your point of view? Who is scamming and who is the victim? I am just learning about this and want to know your thoughts too.
@RedToolHouse Жыл бұрын
The opinion of carbon credits vary dramatically. Looking at the option pragmatically, however, if a company wants to pay me to process waste material for the betterment of my soil, then I will take full advantage of that.
@a15thcenturysuitofgothicarmor Жыл бұрын
@Steve Cobb it's the same with "carbon offset" neither has shown any real affect on emissions. But you know what would? Holding the countries that polluted the most like China accountable. But no one wants to actually do that because they love Chinese money...
@a.m.5439 Жыл бұрын
@@RedToolHouse exactly how I feel.
@Sue-ec6un Жыл бұрын
So, we live on Earth. Where does the carbon go when you put it in the ground? Where does the carbon go when you put it in the air? On the same note, what is the water cycle on Earth? If Earth is nothing but closed systems then how do these things increase or decrease ever? Very interestingly, the carbon produced by the world of the dinosaurs is the same carbon governments imagine they can somehow reduce now. Yes, it's a scam. Is there carbon floating in space, polluting, say, the moon? No The carbon they want to reduce are humans, carbon based life forms in general. But it will never be reduced, whether ash or decomposing bodies, the Earth will absorb all that carbon again again.
@grantmeyer6097 Жыл бұрын
Comment
@BigRigRich11 ай бұрын
NRCS?
@oshitt1 Жыл бұрын
Biochar, carbon credits my ass
@spicyroads Жыл бұрын
Burning wood to save the environment
@ptlmedianowii81417 ай бұрын
carbon as a climate change agent is irrelevant. Greta Thunberg is a climate activist and distant relative of Svante August Arrhenius Nobel prize winner and 'the first to use the principles of physical chemistry to estimate the extent to which increases in the atmospheric carbon dioxide are responsible for the Earth's increasing surface temperature.' it's all in the family so to say.
@joshseigel Жыл бұрын
You are making bio char kinda. The real way it's make is without oxygen. Get a 30 gallon drum fill it with chunks of wood. Put the 30 gallon in a 55 gallon drum. Fill the 55 gallon drum with wood. Burn the outside wood it cooks the wood in the 30 gallon drum. There going to be pot ass in your char when you burn it and put it out.
@joshseigel Жыл бұрын
Worms are the way to go with the char. It has to be charged in my opinion or it just takes for the first year.
@RedToolHouse Жыл бұрын
I use the crucible method for making lump coal for my smoker
@thomasfields208210 ай бұрын
Don't burn wet wood she says as the video shows a guy wetting down his burn with a hose. 😂
@22fingers3 ай бұрын
don't burn wet wood is quite different to don't wet burnt wood don't you think haha
@charlescoker7752 Жыл бұрын
Seems I can find just as many videos saying it does not work as those who say its wonderful. Usually those who claim it is great are selling it.
@22fingers3 ай бұрын
my suggestion if someone is teaching it for free you wont be out of pocket if you try it and i think while you may find some people claiming its nothing to right home about you will struggle to find anyone suggesting it is harmful, the few studies that have been done are very inconclusive but the research is still very much in early days ,this practice has been done for centuries in australia and africa and probably most everywhere else for a long time
@patrickcalhoon35127 ай бұрын
It’s charcoal, changing the name adds no benefit.
@RedToolHouse7 ай бұрын
It is biochar once it has been mingled with nitrogen sources like manure. This adds value and makes it more than charcoal
@thomasfields2082 Жыл бұрын
Seems like this lady just picked some buzz words and put them together. Biochar, carbon cedits and of course block chain. Lol. 😂
@XavierIsraelMatamoros Жыл бұрын
I could care less about carbon emissions. The premise, the conspiracy theory of climate change is a lie.
@peggypastime1278 Жыл бұрын
And? Soooo you care some? ;). This is totally interesting and helpful to improve gardening/farming. Less amendments to spend money and time on! I care about THAT! Thanks for your info, Troy! Appreciate it.
@XavierIsraelMatamoros Жыл бұрын
@@peggypastime1278 Love saving money. Don't buy the carbon lie. Life is carbon based. The agenda is anti-life.
@stevebreedlove9760 Жыл бұрын
Climate change isnt a conspiracy theory. Jfc.
@georgecarlin26567 ай бұрын
Jesus Christ dude, you sound like an environmentalist working out his carbon emissions grant, not like a gardener who wants to give a good advice to other gardeners. Not to mention that carbon emissions is yet another bogus scam against poor countries because rich countries outsource their dirty industries there.
@RedToolHouse7 ай бұрын
I am no enviro nut but if I can get some of my tax money back by playing what ever game is popular at the time especially if it involves waste material I have copious amounts of, I will do it every time.
@georgecarlin26567 ай бұрын
@@RedToolHouse I see, but how do you monetize your, say, 20 wheelbarrows of biochar that you put into your orchard? Do you have a gov official sitting there filming you doing it? Or do they believe you just because you said that you added biochar?
@RedToolHouse7 ай бұрын
That is the "Game" part of all of this. The documentation can be a video I create and submit based on specific guidelines. Moisture testing of the starting by products, weighing finished product, etc. It has all kinds of potential issues and opportunity for shenanigans (just like any other gov. program).
@vanrally814 ай бұрын
Don't listen to these right wing haters. You're disposing of waste, building local ecosystems, and helping the atmospheric composition. They can get all pissy about politics if they want, but it's not relevant. This is about science and survival.@@RedToolHouse
@joeford7350 Жыл бұрын
BS
@RedToolHouse Жыл бұрын
Care to elaborate?
@peggypastime1278 Жыл бұрын
@@RedToolHouse He was saying Best Stuff! He appreciates your info regarding saving time/money on amending gardens/farms!!