Warm Heart Biochar Troughs

 

 This is very impressive.  I have long felt that it had to be possible to produce a technical breakthrough that anyone could learn how to use.  This surely is it.

Obviously there is plenty of fuss work needed to manage the actual burn but the principal is clear enough.  You load the material which usually needs to be well dried. Bio char technology actually calls for drying sheds in order to properly prepare the feed stock. One then loads one of tese kilns and you must then ignite the surface and allow it to get a good burn started.  I suspect that it is at that point in which the wet blanket it thrown over the load.  Emptying is as easy as tilting the bin and raking it into a handy pile..

This limits air flow beautifully but does not cut it off while quenching the top of the charge.  All this is way less work that building a closed kiln which most have been thinking off.

It is also so simple that practice will easily improve efficiency.  Better yet it is easily made by any farmer in his own shop with simple and cheap components.

Warm Heart Biochar Troughs - Versatile and Efficient Biochar in Thailand

 

1/23/2016

 http://greenyourhead.typepad.com/backyard_biochar/2016/11/warm-heart-biochar-troughs-versatile-and-efficient-biochar-in-thailand.html

Kudos to the Warm Heart team for developing a series of trough-shaped Flame Carbonizers designed to work with a diverse array of feedstocks available to small farmers in Thailand and elsewhere. These kilns are similar to the pyramid shaped kilns except they are elongated into troughs in order to accommodate long stalks, branches and stems without the need for cutting. They are brilliant for bamboo!

Warm Heart has done a wonderful job of not only matching kiln design to feedstock, but also of creating and documenting the stoking techniques needed for efficient production with diverse feedstocks, especially light weight materials like rice straw that can ash very quickly if not properly fed to the kiln.

Warm Heart has also provided dimensions and welding details for constructing the kilns. That warms my Open Source heart!

Some pictures below, but make sure you visit the Warm Heart site for all the details:

http://warmheartworldwide.org/new-type-fc-biochar-production-unit/



The Warm Heart Trough Flame Carbonizer



Stoking corn stalks



Stoking rice straw using the "drag method"



Wet blanket quenching method - very innovative!



Stoking bamboo in a longer, narrower kiln



Quenching bamboo biochar



Dimensions