What Time Is It? - Time to Recap

A TLUD  - makes Carbon Smart Energy - building a better world within the boundaries of the physical law of conservation of matter-and does not use well over half it's energy getting to where it needs to be.

If a barrel of oil contains 10 years worth of human labor, a cord of wood contains 47 years of human labor using the same calculation.

Joining together in community spirit is fun, enlightening, and a big part of who we are as humans.  Hope to see you April 2 at Lutie School in Theodosia, MO as we join in community spirit.

When everything we need is somewhere else, we are at least at risk of supply disruption and may be overlooking ancient wisdom bordering on common sense.

We are at an unprecedented time in human history.  I a great big world, empires grew to discover the farthest reaches.  Todays billions of people know that we live in a finite world.  Cooperation is a succession strategy in the  transition from empire into the planetary era, There are more folks in existence with more choices, than at any time in human history.  How food and energy are produced, distributed and consumed has always driven the direction of change.

"I much prefer the sharpest criticism of a single intelligent man to the thoughtless approval of the masses."  - Johannes Kepler

What Time Is It? - Time for Terminology - TLUD

TLUD is an acronym for "Top Lit Up Draft".  Still confused?  That is OK, you are not alone, you are in the majority.

Fire seeking fuel and oxygen is the simple physics of a TLUD, more on that later.

Wildfire VS Controlled Burn

In a wildfire, flames travel with the wind, as fire spreads everywhere it can find the right mix of heat, fuel, and oxygen.  Some areas in the burn zone may be completely skipped as the fire rages past.

In a controlled burn, the fire is lit across the face of the downwind side.  Instead of the wind quickly blowing the fire out as some would think, the fire slowly marches into the wind as it seeks and finds fuel and oxygen.  Usually this gives a much more complete burn of an area than an uncontrolled wildfire.

A camp fire lit underneath that spreads to the top is an uncontrolled burn.  Lighting a camp fire in the middle on top is more difficult, but better controls combustion rate, and maximizes open air charcoal production.

Dog Simple TLUD

Thank you Adam Bacon for pointing out the fallacy of assuming that anyone can figure out what a TLUD is in even a one hour talk.  The "simple physics" happen to be totally counter-intuitive to what was learned through experience.  Fires are lit on the bottom so the flame grows to the top.  That is just the way it works.  People do not quickly unlearn what has been intuitively established by repetition and experience.

All you have to know about this bicycle, is that steering is reversed, so whatever you would normally do to steer, do the opposite.  Simple? Not as simple as it sounds..

It only took me personally one full week with some of the leading biomass energy and small cook stove experts in the world to get a handle on this, so if you don't "get it" from this post, don't feel bad.  But please start experimenting.

Adam's contribution to understanding, what he calls a "dog simple TLUD" is a single wall flue pipe filled with brush, on top of a pile of brush.

Adam Bacon's Dog Simple TLUD

The holes in the side of the tube are for illustration only.  In practice this is a solid tube.

A fire is started on the top of the pile in the tube.  The hot air rising begins pulling air up through the tube.  The atmosphere above the flame in the tube has no oxygen because all oxygen has been consumed.  A flame roars out the top as the hot flammable gas finds oxygen above the upper rim.

The primary fire seeks DOWNWARD, toward more fuel and oxygen, even as the secondary fire roars on top where the hot gas (smoke) finds a fresh supply of oxygen.

This is the essence of solid fuel "gasification".  By adding ever more physical parts (more complexity) engine grade fuel can be made from wood.  Understanding and experimenting with the basics is critical to success with more complex and advanced designs.

Nobody has it all figured out until we are all driving on natures finest instead of fossil fuels.  If you would like to join in a shared educational experience please send email to freedombiomass@gmail.com

Playing with fire is fun!

Few will have the greatness to bend history, but each of us can work to change a small portion of the events, and then the total — all of these acts — will be written in the history of this generation. - RFK

Durable Biochar Producing TLUD Campstove on Instructables..

What Time Is It? - Time for Carbon Smart Energy

Wood with Re-growth is the ONLY carbon zero energy strategy - 1993 Department of Energy Report

Wood is better than nuclear, wind, PV solar, and even large scale hydro for lowest net carbon emissions.  1 Million Btu (1 MBtu) = 293 kW = 120 lb dry wood  = 7 gal. Diesel Oil = 1000 cu.ft. (10 Therms) Natural Gas

"It is obvious that the sun keeps our earth warm with its radiant energy. It is perhaps not so obvious that all living and once living matter on this planet is a form of solar battery..

..When we burn a plant we release the stored water, carbon dioxide and ash along with heat. If we do it right, that's all we get - no pollution."  -- Larry Dobson

Back then they were doing biomass energy the hard way, burning the resource completely to ash.   Volatilizing only the lighter components (smoke) for heat, saving the harder carbon chains as charcoal (biochar) makes nearly perfect combustion easier.  

By interring biochar in soil, biomass energy becomes the only energy strategy that actively reduces concentrations of atmospheric carbon.  Some are already doing it, many more are taking notice.

The technology for smoke burning appliances, even smoke burning internal combustion engines for generators and vehicles is already, all ready. (Hat tip Albert Bates for the already, all ready saying).

In an interesting twist of fate, wood to motive power legend Wayne Keith traveled 232 miles on one million btu of wood, in a truck that travels only 169 miles on a million btu of gasoline at 21 mpg.  That is more than 30% efficiency improvement for an engine that was designed to operate on "smoke from the pit".

Larry Dobson's stove design, burning wood to ash, "a residential cookstove designed by Northern Light R&D burned wood 65 times cleaner than the average woodstove and cleaner than most oil and gas fueled residential furnaces" - Larry Dobson  

With biochar saving stove designs, the cleanliness and efficiency of stoves gets better and easier.  The economic value is that a higher value product is produced than what went into the stove. Wayne Keith's motive power design includes "ash dumps" for periodic clean out of beautiful high sheen biochar slipped through the grate to improve fuel quality and reliability over wide operating ranges typical while driving on the highway.

Using above ground energy is carbon smart if it stopped at zero.  Char saving designs go beyond zero to net atmospheric carbon reduction.  The benefits don't stop there.   

Interring biochar in soil improves soil microbiota and plant growth.  Biochar improves local water quality, similar to an under sink water filter.  Neighbors helping neighbors build char saving biomass energy designs tailored to locally available biomass improves local economies.

Biochar energy solutions are a win-win-win, improved energy, environment and economy.  Localizing energy is a carbon smart 21st century energy paradigm that is not hard to do, only difficult to conceptualize for those who have never seen it.

“To truth only a brief celebration of victory is allowed between the two long periods during which it is condemned as paradoxical, or disparaged as trivial.”  - Arthur Schopenhauer 

What Time Is It? - Time to revoke the law of conservation of matter.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Conservation_of_mass

When a million barrels of "crude" per day are pumped from below ground into the air, where does it go?

A kindergarten kid might tell you that it goes everywhere the wind blows.  Advanced physicists will say the same thing in a different way.  It is fundamental law of classical physics that matter is neither created or destroyed in an isolated system like spaceship earth.  It remains "somewhere" in the system.

Anthropogenic (human caused) environmental change is not even a question based upon what advanced science knows, what a child understands, and what is measured.

Atmospheric carbon is measurable and is measured.  The results agree with intuition and physics. 

Humans using  "smoke from the pit" for energy have predictably and measurably caused an environmental change to the tune of a 40% increase in atmospheric carbon from 1960 to the present day.  While the effects may be questioned (warming, cooling, changed weather patterns), the results are only disputable in small degree.  

If "advanced" societies used salt for energy and increased salinity in the oceans as a result, to the tune of 40% increase in ocean salinity, the denial patter would likely be the same.

Some would say nature is beyond human control, salt levels are a natural balance.  Some would say it is a good thing because the oceans might otherwise some day run out of salt.  Etc.

But an increase of 40% would raise ocean salinity from 3.5% which has sustained diverse life for eons, to almost 5% which is not survivable for many species.

Wake the folk up.  Lobby your elected representatives.  Tell them it is well past time to revoke the law of conservation of matter.  Their actions could make all the difference, and our actions need not change.

"Buckminster Fuller said that spaceship earth was so ingeniously designed that no one has a clue that we are on one, flying through the universe at a million miles per hour, with no need for seatbelts, lots of room in coach, and really good food—but all that is changing."  Paul Hawken

What Time Is It - Time to Ponder Efficiency

Lawrence Livermore National Laboratory energy use charts for the USA.


2002

58% rejected/wasted

2008

58% rejected/wasted

2014

60% rejected/wasted

More..
https://flowcharts.llnl.gov/archive.html

Short version of the truth, the USA wastes more energy than it uses.  The greatest waste is petroleum as transportation fuel, 75-80% wasted.

Is the ability to survive while wasting greatly, the sign of a great civilization?  Or does it signal a human caused problem when everything we need is somewhere else?

Localization in food, energy and economies is a real simple way to reduce a whole lot of wasted energy.

The eco-village makes sense environmentally, AND economically.  People easily get more done when they waste less energy doing it.  Eco-villages are not a retreat to the "stone age".  They are the forward path to a zero waste culture that creates more than it consumes.

"There are no environmental problems. There are only environmental symptoms of human problems" -Robert Gilman, context.org

More discussion by treehugger Lloyd Alter

What Time Is It? - Time To Check Out BTU

Simplifications help in understanding the energy big picture.

BTU, British Thermal Unit, is the amount of WORK required to raise one pound of water one degree Fahrenheit.

BTU is a measure of work, so can be related to all other forms of work measurement.

1 BTU = 252 calories = 1055 joules = 1055 watt second

Energy sources, like oil and wood are rated in btu, with that number being potential btu.  How efficiently the resource is used has no bearing on that number.

Using these type of calculations, it has been said that a barrel of oil is the equivalent of more than 10 years of human labor.  That makes oil a very valuable and necessary resource for powering today's lifestyles.  Oil is well worth fighting over.

Using those same calculations, purely work potential, a cord of wood holds the equivalent of about 47 years of human labor.  Mostly we look for ways to quickly be rid of the excess, like piling it up and burning it out in the open.

What Time Is It - Time to Join Together

Dave Haenke speaks Succession Forestry at O.N.E

The Ozarks Neighborly Exchange, O.N.E. is a group of neighbors joined together in actions to thoughtfully improve their local area, build community, and nurture the environment.

Bonzo visited a few years back to listen to the thoughts of succession forest strategist David Haenke.  David's expertise and lifelong commitment was immediately apparent as he shared more enlightenment in half hour than gleaned from months of online research.

Other speakers that day were equally fascinating.  Topics included biochar, permaculture, year round indoor growing in Missouri, crops selection, and community building.

Positive energy and good will flow all day long.  Very encouraging to see the results when a community joins together to build a whole greater than the sum of the parts.

• What:  O.N.E. Congress
• When: Saturday, April 2, 2016, 7:30 AM to 5:30 PM
• Where:  Lutie High School, Theodosia, MO

Who includes David Yarrow, world renowned "carbon smart" biochar advocate and regular Acres magazine contributor.  Plus many more speakers for a full day of talks on living well on our earth.

Bonzo will be there with biochar kilns including the JAKE in operation.

Jim Corbett of corbettreport.com reports on community solution to modern problems.  "A spirit of sharing"

O.N.E. 2014 Community Building