Ep.2 Waste is Context: Synthesizing a new kind of biochar from wastewater sludge

Featured guest Garrett Benisch is Chief Development Officer at Bioforcetech Corporation, a Bay Area company turning organic waste into carbon negative materials. Bioforcetech promotes a few basic tenets: Stop Landfill, Protect Ecosystems, and Utilize Waste, to name just a few. That last one is important.

In the company’s efforts to Fix and Store Carbon (two other tenets), Bioforcetech manufactures a distinct form of biochar called OurCarbon. Biochar is made when biomass sources like trees and plants undergo pyrolysis to yield an ashy and sterile carbon byproduct – has been used to improve soil fertility and boost agricultural yields.

OurCarbon is a form of biochar. But where it comes from, how it’s produced and scaled, and what it’s used for all represent something truly new in the waste-to-value economy.