John Wolfe

Hi all,

I have made a post on here before about building a biochar retort and harvesting energy from it in the form of electricity. Thermoelectric generators appear to be the move, but in order to calculate how much energy is going to be provided from our retort, an estimate for how long the pyrolysis process will last. The plans are to use a 55-gallon drum as the pyrolysis chamber. The kiln will be well insulated and the energy will be harvested from the exhaust.

I was wondering if anyone on here had some experience with biochar retorts and would be able to offer me a rough estimate of how long I might be able to keep this kiln up to temperature. I'm a mechanical engineering student about to graduate in May and this is actually a part of my senior design project so any advice here would be great!

Thanks!

Thanks for the advice! This link goes into detail about what is expected of us in our design (http://thehappyberry.com/BioCharProject.pdf). The guy who wants this does not have anything set in stone besides that he wants some type of way to harness the energy from the kiln.

We are unsure if the TLUD or the retort would be better for our situation. We are still very early in the design process, so a lot of unknowns are still plaguing us. Also Mr. Cox, we do understand how much easier it would be to directly heat something, but I'm afraid it would not be that practical to simply heat something on his farm. I will attach other helpful information on our project if this interests you!

This is a drawing of what the man we are working with envisioned this thing to look like.
http://thehappyberry.com/BioCharDrawingNov2016.pdf

We are looking to meet a $5000 budget so it doesn't have to be dirt cheap. This is a long-term investment for his farm.

Appreciate the links! I wish that the trench burn idea is all that I had to propose to the farm we're working with, but unfortunately they want a much more involved design. Definitely some helpful information in those videos though! Thanks.

Hi all,

I am senior engineering student at Clemson University working on my Capstone design project. My team and I have been given the task of designing a Kiln that will turn a 55-gallon drum full of waste wood from a farm into charcoal for the purpose of creating a material called biochar. We are currently at the design phase where we need to determine what materials we will use to build the kiln. We need to insulate the kiln as much as possible as we also need to harness the heat energy from the kiln and convert that energy into usable electricity. The kiln will need to operate at temperatures up to 600 degrees Celsius. One huge constraint we have for our design is cost, so are there any materials out there that we could design such a kiln while operating at an economically viable rate? We are currently considering firebrick, but have noticed how expensive this material can be. Are there any suggestions that you might offer us? This design will eventually be made public knowledge in hopes of all local farmers being able to produce their own biochar to fertilize their soil at a low cost.

Thanks!
John