The New 'Black Gold' Needs More Bulls
The world needs to be more bullish on biochar and its benefits to the atmosphere.
Don’t call it waste.
Photographer: Michele Sibiloni/AFP/Getty Images
To most people, black gold means oil, the substance that helped build the modern world while causing the climate crisis. But a new treasure on the market is getting prospectors excited, not least for the role it could play in fixing the problem fossil fuels created.
This lucrative material, called biochar, is a novel method of carbon dioxide removal. By essentially baking organic material at extremely high temperatures in the absence of oxygen — a process named pyrolysis — a black charcoal packed with stable carbon is created. The CO2 that would have otherwise entered the atmosphere as organic matter decomposes is therefore stored for hundreds of years.