Preparation and Application of Biochars for Organic and Microbial Control in Wastewater Treatment Regimes

Preparation Methods And Physicochemical Properties Of Biochars

Biochar, as earlier defined, is a porous material produced through thermochemical conversion of biomass in a minimally oxygenated high temperature environment (IBI, 2013). The production utilizes organic materials such as wood (Schimmelpfennig & Glaser, 2012; Liu et al., 2010), animal manure (Park et al., 2011) and agricultural waste (Demirbas, 2004). Most of these starting materials are readily available and quite often the choice of biomass will depend on the most abundant one in a given area.

Due to the diversity of these organic materials, field and laboratory studies have shown that the yielding biochars have different properties such as composition, porosity, BET surface area and total pore volume (Ozcimen and Ersoy-Mericboyu, 2010). Apart from the choice of initial feedstock biomass, the physicochemical properties of the final biochar product are also determined by preparation conditions such as heating temperature and reaction duration and activation methods applied (Onay, 2007). These properties play a vital role in determining their performance and application in the environment. The preparation methods used for biochar production include; pyrolysis, gasification and hydrothermal carbonization (HTC)