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Unlocking Biochar, Power of Sustainable Agriculture

Arfiana Maulina
The Environment
Published in
3 min readJan 23, 2025
Photo by Luke Porter on Unsplash

Biochar might sound like another trendy buzzword, but it’s legit.

It’s not just for farmers.

It’s for anyone who cares about healthier soil, cutting emissions, and managing waste without trashing the planet. It’s ancient tech meeting modern problems.

Biochar is basically charcoal made for the soil, not your BBQ. It’s created by heating organic material (stuff like wood scraps, crop leftovers, or food waste) in a low-oxygen environment, which locks up carbon and creates a nutrient-packed product that plants love.

Amazonian farmers were ahead of their time. Thousands of years ago, they made terra preta (a fancy way of saying “dark earth”) by mixing charred biomass into the soil. Their farms were crazy fertile.

Fast forward to now, and we’re using the same idea to tackle modern issues like climate change and crappy soil quality.

Biochar isn’t magic. It’s all about pyrolysis.

Heat organic stuff without much oxygen, and you end up with three things:

  1. Biochar : The star of the show.
  2. Syngas : A mix of gases that can power stuff.

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Arfiana Maulina
Arfiana Maulina

Written by Arfiana Maulina

Marketing | Sustainability | Content Creator @arfianamaulina

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