New Ocean biochar corporation

[Ronal Larson]

Lists:

1.   I think this is a first:  commercial biochar from seaweed!  (Glad to hear of any earlier).  Puts biochar in the Ocean CDR category - which could greatly accelerate the date for the first annual Gigatonne CO2 removal.

2.   This coming from this  news release - 

UK Start-up Launches Seaweed Project To Combat Climate Change

by Agility PR Solutions, einnews.com, May 10, 2023, 00:43 GMT

„Carbon Kapture, a start-up dedicated to the removal of CO₂ from the atmosphere, announce the launch of its first seaweed farm. The company has developed a business model allowing its customers to sponsor seaweed grown on ropes to absorb CO₂ directly from the sea. It then converts the seaweed into biochar, a stable form of carbon that can be used to enrich soil and reduce the need for fertiliser. Carbon Kapture has partnered with shellfish farmers in Ireland to grow the seaweed, with plans for its first farm to become even larger than Amazon’s newly funded North Sea Farm 1 project by the end of the year.“

L

3.   Their full website at https://carbonkapture.com/.     Gives a sales pitch that I haven’t seen before for any CDR approach

Ron

[Michael Hayes]

Thanks, Ron

Blue Biochar makes most limiting factors found in traditional Biochar C math rather moot. Thank's for your prior help on sketching out the Blue Biochar Initiative, Ron. This seaweed startup is small, yet I like their energy in simply getting out there and doing it.

Beyond the typically considered aquatic crops for Biochar, such as seaweeds, seagrasses, and even microalgae, the use of marine resources can also be used to grow many typical land crops. 

The Netherlands became the second largest food exporter by largely shifting to greenhouse crops. The marine space is somewhat larger than the Netherlands, with a few more resources than the Netherlands, and floating bioreactors are not an engineering challange nor are reactors likely a financial challange. The international governance of an advanced offshore farming/Biochar operation, even a truely vast scale operation, has few current convention limitations.

Converting marine C, which we have too much of, into soil C, which we have too little of, will likely help mitigate atmospheric C in the most environmentally balanced way, in possably the most equitable and governable way possible.

Your personal work and guidance on Biochar has helped Biochar become the current leader in CDR C credit purchases. I call that a win for land-based Biochar and you. The CDR potential of Blue Biochar can not be devalued simply because of the land centric Biochar success.

Best regards

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[Rick Berg]

Great to see new solutions emerging. I'm curious about the halogenated organic compound content of biochar from seaweed/kelp. Has any study or dataset been published?  

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[Michael Hayes]

Rick, fresh water rinsing of the biomass is needed, and dewatering the seaweed grown in the wild or microalgae grown in tanks is also needed. Recycling of fresh water and production of heat for dewatering by an offshore platform is within reasonable current technical abilities.

Moreover, seaweed can be grown in confinement allowing just the faster growing tops to be harvested every few days, much like one would mow a lawn. The typical line-based cultivation method has many low tech advantages, yet using confinement can likely increase harvesting efficiencies and better protect the crop from pathogens and grazers.

The USDA should and likely will, sometime in the future, offer loans for Blue Biochar CDR equipment purchase. The use of cultivation confinement systems, or grow tanks, eliminates many of the environmental question and economic questions that may surround a vast scale use of Blue Biochar methods.

Best regards

[Michael Hayes]

Seaweed Biochar:

https://www.nature.com/articles/srep09665

On Wed, May 17, 2023, 10:34 AM Rick Berg <ri...@nori.com> wrote:

[Tom Goreau]

Seaweeds must be dried and rinsed of salts if used as mulch for land plants, but neither may be needed for hydrothermal carbonation.

 

Thomas J. F. Goreau, PhD
President, Global Coral Reef Alliance

Chief Scientist, Blue Regeneration SL
President, Biorock Technology Inc.

Technical Advisor, Blue Guardians Programme, SIDS DOCK

37 Pleasant Street, Cambridge, MA 02139

gor...@globalcoral.org
www.globalcoral.org
Skype: tomgoreau
Tel: (1) 617-864-4226 (leave message)

 

Books:

Geotherapy: Innovative Methods of Soil Fertility Restoration, Carbon Sequestration, and Reversing CO2 Increase

http://www.crcpress.com/product/isbn/9781466595392

 

Innovative Methods of Marine Ecosystem Restoration

http://www.crcpress.com/product/isbn/9781466557734

 

No one can change the past, everybody can change the future

 

It’s much later than we think, especially if we don’t think

 

Those with their heads in the sand will see the light when global warming and sea level rise wash the beach away

 

Geotherapy: Regenerating ecosystem services to reverse climate change

 

To view this discussion on the web visit https://groups.google.com/d/msgid/CarbonDioxideRemoval/CABjtO1fmnHfsnWEhnd-Fq_R_F%2BJs%3D5-sykB6iJi3MuquJ53CQg%40mail.gmail.com.

[Tom Goreau]

Seaweed samples were rinsed and oven-dried before dry pyrolysis to biochar, a large energy sink not needed for hydrothermal carbonation.

 

It would be interesting to see a comparison.

 

Thomas J. F. Goreau, PhD
President, Global Coral Reef Alliance

Chief Scientist, Blue Regeneration SL
President, Biorock Technology Inc.

Technical Advisor, Blue Guardians Programme, SIDS DOCK

37 Pleasant Street, Cambridge, MA 02139

gor...@globalcoral.org
www.globalcoral.org
Skype: tomgoreau
Tel: (1) 617-864-4226 (leave message)

 

Books:

Geotherapy: Innovative Methods of Soil Fertility Restoration, Carbon Sequestration, and Reversing CO2 Increase

http://www.crcpress.com/product/isbn/9781466595392

 

Innovative Methods of Marine Ecosystem Restoration

http://www.crcpress.com/product/isbn/9781466557734

 

No one can change the past, everybody can change the future

 

It’s much later than we think, especially if we don’t think

 

Those with their heads in the sand will see the light when global warming and sea level rise wash the beach away

 

Geotherapy: Regenerating ecosystem services to reverse climate change

 

 

 

From: <carbondiox...@googlegroups.com> on behalf of Michael Hayes <electro...@gmail.com>
Date: Wednesday, May 17, 2023 at 2:07 PM
To: Rick Berg <ri...@nori.com>
Cc: Ronal Larson <rongre...@comcast.net>, "Biochar.groups.io" <ma...@biochar.groups.io>, Carbon Dioxide Removal <carbondiox...@googlegroups.com>
Subject: Re: [CDR] New Ocean biochar corporation

 

Seaweed Biochar:

 

https://www.nature.com/articles/srep09665

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[Michael Hayes]

Jim's TG method offers lots of hot water. Solar concentration stations can also provide the heat, yet TG would seem to offer more crossover advantages.

[Rick Berg]

I'm not sure rinsing surface salts will fully address the possibility of HOC formation. Hopefully the temperature/pressure conditions are right (or can be found) to prevent their formation. Looking forward to more data as these methods are developed.

[Michael Hayes]

Rick, et al.,

Unless a specific paper on HTC/HOCs can be found, the closest body of work is within the sewage sludge treatment field, or Hydrochar production. Injecting saltwater into a sewage facility that already uses HTC might provide relevent HOC data for Blue Biochar options.

[Andrew Lockley]

BBC News - 'We are selling a product that we hope gets discontinued'

https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/business-65572881

This article details a large source of problematic sargassum, which may be suitable for char production.

Andrew Lockley 

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