Posted on 06/04/2023 7:17:46 PM PDT by NautiNurse
At a red-brick factory in the German port city of Hamburg, cocoa bean shells go in one end, and out the other comes an amazing black powder with the potential to counter climate change.
The substance, dubbed biochar, is produced by heating the cocoa husks in an oxygen-free room to 600 degrees Celsius (1,112 Fahrenheit).
The process locks in greenhouse gases and the final product can be used as a fertilizer, or as an ingredient in the production of "green" concrete.
While the biochar industry is still in its infancy, the technology offers a novel way to remove carbon from the Earth's atmosphere, experts say.
According to the UN's Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change (IPCC), biochar could potentially be used to capture 2.6 billion of the 40 billion metric tons of CO2 currently produced by humanity each year.
[Snip]
The plant, one of the largest in Europe, takes delivery of the used cocoa shells via a network of gray pipes from a neighboring chocolate factory.
[Snip]
[Wait for it...]
But to turn a profit, the biochar business has come up with another idea: selling carbon certificates.
The idea is to sell certificates to companies looking to balance out their carbon emissions by producing a given amount of biochar.
(Excerpt) Read more at phys.org ...
Not counting for all the lead in chocolate
PT Barnum Chocolateers.
Cocoa bean hulls could work during FL’s dry season. I may give it a try later this year.
If you find a place that sells this that doesn’t incur a huge shipping rate to get say 50-100# of this let me know. I’ve been looking for the past 10 years.
I live in Florida and don’t see why it wouldn’t work here. I’ve been trying to get it for 10+ years now with no success. Same goes for rice hulls for mulch.
True Value may be a good bet. My local store is great for working to obtain desired products.
I doubt if there are enough cocoa bean hulls in the known world to put a dent into nature’s own greenhouse gases.
An excuse to raise the price of chocolate.
Add what is being used to heat up the husks to 1,112 degrees F?
It would need full sun to dry out, or it would become a moldy mess imo.
Heat source omitted, but the room is oxygen-free. That should be worth some bonus social justice points. How do the workers breathe?
Not to worry. There is an endless supply of carbon credit certificates.
Or NOT!
I’m getting triggered by this total BS.
So when the “biochar” is fully saturated with carbon, it could be sold and used in BBQ grills?
Is there anything chocolate can’t do?
The only thing that can counter climate change is making the middle class poor, and making the poor poorer.
Well, thank goodness for that!
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