What does the phrase “fossil fuel shortage” mean to you? Higher gasoline prices? Higher heating costs? How about no food? 40% of energy consumed in food production is used in the manufacture of fertilizers and pesticides. Without natural gas, petroleum, and phosphorus-rich rock (the latter of which is energy-intensive to mine and often riddled with radioactive elements to boot) the fertilizers upon which we indirectly feed would not exist, and by implication neither would we.

Famine for lack of fossil fuel, however, need not occur. A process known as Biochar (or more professionally as pyrolysis) exists which can convert any carbon-based fuel – wood, lawn trimmings, effluence, perhaps one day even plastic – through nearly anaerobic combustion into a mixture of gaseous carbon monoxide, methane, and ethane which can then be distilled into syn-gas or biodiesel and then used to fuel the combustion process and be sold for profit. But the bio-diesel, lovely as it sounds in itself, is only a by-product: the real “black gold” is the charcoal, the solid remnants of the original organic fuel source.

Capable of storing carbon underground for tens of thousands of years, charcoal binds to soil nutrients (especially nitrogen and phosphorus) improving soil fertility far more effectively than water-soluble chemical fertilizers. In search of a testament to the efficacy of charcoal, you need look no further than the Amazon rainforest. The ancient Amazonians based their economy, civilization, and environment on a rich mixture of compost, manure, and charcoal known as Terra Preta de Indio. By conservative estimates 12% of the rainforest grows on this soil, soil some nine times more effective than chemically treated soils. We would do well to take a leaf from the Amazonians’ variegated book.

It will be no surprise if chemical companies will be quick in seeking to squelch a Charcoal Revolution. They will probably argue that Biochar and Biochar facilities are expensive and untested. They’ll probably contest, “Why invest in the new, when we’ve got the tried-and-true?” The answer is simple and evidenced: “chemiculture” may be tried, but it isn’t true. Why has India’s water table all but disappeared? Why are the only things growing in the U.S. the deserts? Why must fertilizer applications increase annually just to maintain past crop levels? And could Biochar be more expensive than all the lakes, rivers, coastlands, and aquifers destroyed by agricultural run-off?

Biochar, in its carbon negativity, has the potential to change the world. It could turn our wasted agricultural plots into “New Amazons.” It could eliminate our dependency on nitrogen and phosphorous fertilizers, and the nitrous oxide and ground-level ozone derived thereof. It could digest our landfills, turning our plastic mountains into living subsoil. It could usher in an era of agricultural sustainability and ensure that when all else fails, at least we won’t go hungry.

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