U.S.-FocUSed Biochar report - BioEnergy Lists

y Biochar.- Societal Benefits: Biochar will provide many new jobs, which must stay in America – not overseas. Biocharwill provide an increased and more cost effective supply of food and fiber.- Technological Benefits: Because the Biochar production and soils approaches are only beginning to bewell understood, exactly what causes the large observed improvements in soil health offers opportunities formany types of engineers and soil scientists to learn and contribute even more.- Legal Benefits: Sorting through the approaches needed to appropriately and fairly recompense Biocharproducers will provide a national benefit achieved through the legal profession.- Environmental Benefits: Most of Biochar’s benefits will accrue here. Foremost, is the unique capability ofBiochar to “permanently” remove carbon dioxide from the atmosphere – with enormous implications if we,along with every other nation, can avoid one or more disastrous carbon-related tipping points. Biochar can’tsupply all of the nation’s needed carbon neutral energy from the released pyrolysis gases and/or thermalenergy – nor does it need to. Biochar off-gases, if the Biochar contribution is sufficiently large, can enablean all-renewable energy suite when coupled with the non-dispatchable wind, solar and other RE resources.Biochar can function as the sustainable dance partner for other renewable energy generation. The renewableenergy generation with Biochar integration will enable a jump from 20% decarbonized energy generation to100% renewable energy generation with a carbon negative signature.These above seven benefit categories should not be viewed as being linearly related to the amount of char. Manyof the above benefits will be seen early. Conversely, it may be the last of the annual additions that may prove mostvaluable – if we can avoid a tipping point. It is too early to make predictions on Biochar’s monetary benefits orthe need for, or size of, subsidies.The following pages show that a proposed 1 US “C-wedge” (1 Billion Tonnes or 1 Gigatonne of carbon) size is inrough agreement with several of the existing worldwide bioenergy and Biochar estimates. However, the majorbioenergy-related estimates of the US (and by extension, the world) resource base have not included some importantbiomass resource areas and especially those possible with Biochar. The US biomass resource is available,sufficient, and necessary for Biochar to become the key US renewable energy resource, while also increasing nonfossil based food and fiber resources while providing low-cost carbon negative climate values.5.2 IntroductionThis section addresses the possible maximum size of Biochar activities in about 2050 – with some comments onthe period from now to 2030. After introducing a few key terms below, succeeding sections cover:• Projection methodology• A One Gigatonne Biochar “Vision” Scenario• Lessons Learned from the Scenario• Still Untouched Biochar Resource Analysis areas,• Recommendations for additional resource analysis• Closing thoughts.Limits. There will be essentially no discussion in this Section of the three major areas of high current Biochar interest:how to produce char, how to optimize soil productivity and which policies will best enable Biochar. Othersections of this six Section report go into these three critical Biochar topics.Equation. The many different resource magnitudes which follow (with one exception dealing with manures)follow this simple product relationship:Q=P×A×F (5.1)52U.S.-Focused Biochar Report:Assessment of Biochar’s Benefits for the United States of America