North America's 1st biochar facility opens following partnership with Minneapolis, Xcel Energy
The City of Minneapolis is fighting climate change in a way no other city in North America is doing.
When emerald ash borer kills trees, or utility companies trim back branches around power lines, it creates wood waste that releases carbon dioxide into the atmosphere.
This summer, Minneapolis will open a facility to take wood waste and turn it into something called biochar.
"Looks like wood chips but black. It's not charcoal, but it's like it," said Jim Doten, Minneapolis Carbon Sequestration program manager.
Wood gets superheated and condensed to form the biochar, which traps the CO₂ in for thousands of years.
But then, biochar can be used in many other ways.
"As the Swiss Army knife of climate tools, it also does amazing environmental benefits such as growing more food, saving our trees," Doten said. "But also our public works will be using it in stormwater, transportation, planting trees, etc. We're working with the University of Minnesota on a number of different applications."
Leaders on the project say the facility will remove more than 3,500 tons of carbon dioxide from the air a year — the equivalent of taking nearly 800 cars off the road.
Xcel Energy will be supplying most of the wood waste to be processed.
"For customers, it won't be any different in terms of how they use our energy," said Suzanne Murphy with Xcel Energy. "They'll just have the benefit of knowing that their company is really trying to innovate and do things smarter and better with reducing carbon in our environment."
The city says this won't cost taxpayers anything. It's being paid for with grants and fees already in your utility bill.
"This is an area, in biochar, where we can go on offense, where we can do more," said Minneapolis Mayor Jacob Frey. "That's why we're the first city to use biochar. It's also why we're the first city to have a facility to make biochar."
Studies have suggested biochar could have some negative effects, including contaminating soil or groundwater.
