Charcoal experiment in Japan

Takuro Haraguchi

Tokyo Institute of Technology

1. Background

2. Preparation of charcoal

3. Burning experiment

4. Cause

Content

1. BackgroundI have started charcoal production from agricultural waste by following D-Lab instruction at MIT. But, there are a lot of problem of charcoal Production, mainly development of new type of binder since cassava type has not worked well in Kenya.

Hence, I decided visit Mr. Rameshand his team in Nepal where charcoal project is working well to learn know-how which enable us to manage charcoal production in Kenya sustainably.

Charcoal team, one of project at

International Development

Academy at Tokyo Institute of

Technology prepared charcoal

with clay by following the

instruction that charcoal powder

should be mixed with clay 1 to 9

by volume since I learnt it is the

best binder, considering with

efficiency and cost in Nepal.

2. Charcoal preparation

Charcoal powder Clay

Charcoal2

Charcoal3

2. Charcoal preparation

※Hardening by hands without compressor

Powder1

Powder2 (finer size)

Charcoal1

Charcoal 1 Charcoal 2 Charcoal 3

It needs a lot of clay in order to harden it. After all, ratio between clay and charcoal became to be hardened because particle size of charcoal is bigger.

Mixing charcoal power with clay by 1 : 9 by volume, it seems to be harden but connection of charcoal with surface of it is too weak so that powder of charcoal easily fall down if I scratch it.

Mixing charcoal power with clay by 1.5 : 8 by volume, it seems to be better since it is harder than charcoal 1.

Charcoal : Clay = 3:1 Charcoal : Clay = 9:1 Charcoal : Clay = 8.5 : 1.5

2. Charcoal preparation

Obviously, color of charcoal is blown so that it did not burn due to too much charcoal.

We were expecting that this type could burn but result is that charcoal 2 did not burn and just becoming gray to blown because I think charcoal powder was not connected with others.

Since charcoal 2 did not burn, charcoal 3, less amount of charcoal, also did not burn.

Charcoal 1 Charcoal 2 Charcoal 3

Charcoal : Clay = 3:1 Charcoal : Clay = 9:1 Charcoal : Clay = 8.5 : 1.5

3. Burning experiment

I am thinking reason of failure is that ratio between charcoal and

clay. Amount of charcoal should be increased since a reason of

not burning is low ration of charcoal, I think. But, a problem rise

if amount of charcoal is increased, which is that hardness of

charcoal become weaker. To overcome this difficulty, using

compressor might be key to harden it with less amount of clay.

But, I am not sure whether it can work well so that we did not

use it during the preparation.

What do you think about this?

4. Cause