What are the costs and benefits of producing and using biochar?
The benefits that potentially flow from biochar production and use include waste reduction, energy co-production, improved soil fertility and structure, and climate change mitigation. Not all of these benefits are accounted for under current economic systems, but under the carbon constrained economies of the future, the climate mitigation benefit is likely to be accounted for as an economic benefit. Biochar benefits are partly offset by the costs of production, mainly hauling and processing feedstocks. Profitability of biochar systems will be especially sensitive to prices for energy and for greenhouse gas reductions and offsets. We do not have good data on the cost of various biochar production systems, because most of these are in development or are purely experimental. One of IBI’s principal objectives is to improve our understanding of the cost of producing biochar from various feedstocks. See Chapter 19: Economics of Biochar Production, Utilisation and Emissions, in Biochar for En
