Latest comments posted about “China is on the right track” on ChinaDialogue en-gb http://www.chinadialogue.net/article/show/single/en/3274--China-is-on-the-right-track- http://staging.chinadialogue.net/images/cdlogo.gif http://www.chinadialogue.net/article/show/single/en/3274--China-is-on-the-right-track- 2."Soft Straw ": Representatives of soft straws are corn, wheat and rice. In many places in China, most of those soft straws are shattered and put back to the field. This effectively controls the air pollution caused by incinerating. However, shattering straws and putting them back to field could inevitably produce methane and carbon dioxide released by microorganism. I have made some progress in the study of soft straw. Even though soft straws can not be produced into straw charcoal of high quality for industry owing to its material limitations, it still can be converted to stable straw charcoal. Mon, 19 Oct 2009 22:32:43 +0000 http://www.chinadialogue.net/article/summary/3274#comment-9438 http://www.chinadialogue.net/article/summary/3274#comment-9438 There are two ways of charred straw to solve climate change. Straw as a kind of short-term-grown crop can be divided into two categories. One is "hard straw" including cotton, sunflower, Castor and those relatively heavy plants. Another category is called "soft straw" including corn, wheat, rice and those relatively lightweight plants.1."hard straw“： Use the equipment invented by Pang Xifeng to make the hard straw charred. The straw charcoal we get, take cotton straw for instance, has 72% of the fixed carbon rate, and 6200 Kcal of calorific value. These two indexes approximately reach the same level as wood charcoal does. In China,20 million tonnes of wood charcoal is consumed annually, including fragrance (fragrance of Buddha,mosquito incense and etc.), gunpowder (firecrackers and fireworks), industrial use (active carbon), high tech agriculture and civil use (hotpot and oven). Whereas, 3 tonnes of woods is required to produce 1 tonne of wood charcoal. If we use straw charcoal instead of wood charcoal, we will save some 60 million tonnes of woods. If we let those saved woods keep growing(a tree lives 60 yeas and absorb 1 tonne carbon dioxide), they will become an increasing "green lung" of the world. They can absorb the extra green house gas emitted by industries and relieve the situation of climate change. At the same time, those waste straws could become a resource for production. This can both get economic profits by straw charcoal and its deep processed production and become a new industry of the national economy. We sincerely hope that under good policy guidance, those enterprises which use straw charcoal as raw materials keep using it, and those which doesn't start to study it and replace wood charcoal with straw charcoal. Then we would realize the idea that wood charcoal is going to get off the stage of history and confront the new era of harmony between industrialization and ecological environment. Mon, 19 Oct 2009 22:31:25 +0000 http://www.chinadialogue.net/article/summary/3274#comment-9437 http://www.chinadialogue.net/article/summary/3274#comment-9437 Why is straw charcoal able to replace woods? Crops are grown in short-term cycle. With the ripe and harvest process, crops themselves have been dead. If we let it go, those straws will rot and produce a large amount of methane, whereas, methane is 20 times as the effect of carbon dioxide to green house effect. At the same time it will release carbon dioxide by the function of microorganism, form green house gas and seriously pollute the environment. If those straws can be scientifically used, charred into charcoal or made into deep processed products, it would eventually replace woods. In the light of this situation, woods can be saved and restored, forest's ability to absorb carbon dioxide can be elevated, green house gas can be reduced and the problem of climate change will be solved. Fri, 16 Oct 2009 02:46:34 +0000 http://www.chinadialogue.net/article/summary/3274#comment-9431 http://www.chinadialogue.net/article/summary/3274#comment-9431 Professor Pan Genxing at Nanjing University is actively engaged in soil climate research and is in the process of carrying out laboratory tests on several specimens that show that the soil quality is extremely stable. If we are able to carbonise field straw, then this will effectively improve the soil environment and would be beneficial to crop growth. It would also consequently solve the continuous soil cultivation barriers. Furthermore, such a process would be capable of stabilising soil cultivation within the next 300 years. Crop photosynthesis; absorbing carbon dioxide in air and water to form nutrients. If straw was to undergo the carbonisation process then it would succeed in obtaining the stability of carbon, and would reduce the levels of carbon dioxide in the atmosphere. Utilising soil in this particular way will greatly improve China’s soil farming situation, but solving the continuous soil cultivation barriers. Moreover, carbon dioxide can be stored for up to 300 years thus reducing greatly the pressure of global warming. Pushing for expansion, positive results in the present will benefit generations for thousands of years. The costs of CDM business transactions are only one part of the solution with government subsidies remaining. Soft straw carbonisation technology research is not impossible with commercial added value, the prospects of which appear very good. But, we need more in depth research as well as an increase in funding. I, myself am not the source of individual research funding and am powerless to assume further responsibility and so the inconvenience caused will be even greater. This comment was translated by Laura Bewley. Fri, 16 Oct 2009 02:47:35 +0000 http://www.chinadialogue.net/article/summary/3274#comment-9432 http://www.chinadialogue.net/article/summary/3274#comment-9432 At the beginning of human civilization, when the mineral resources were not exploited, animals inhaled oxygen and exhaled carbon dioxide, plants did photosynthesis: taking in carbon dioxide while exhausting out oxygen; so the atmosphere at that time was a virtuous cycle. With the industrialization progressing, large amount of oil as well as minerals were exploited and used. The use of those minerals released surplus big amount of green house gas like carbon dioxide. The gas broke the normal cycle and made the global warming. Then we came up a conclusion; which is: in the chain of the cycle, industrial exhausts was an addition part of it, and that means carbon dioxide release became more powerful. Meanwhile, because forests were destroyed by cutting the trees, the photosynthesis part became less powerful. Use straw charcoals instead of woods, restore forests, minimize the releasing amount of carbon dioxide. Tue, 13 Oct 2009 21:36:32 +0000 http://www.chinadialogue.net/article/summary/3274#comment-9415 http://www.chinadialogue.net/article/summary/3274#comment-9415 Financial mechanisms such as those which provide a licence to pollute are the opposite of what is so urgently needed - a world which has "decarbpnised". Further, much of the money which those mechanisms would involve is likely to be used up in transaction costs - particularly in the sort of high risk country that is demanding money from industrialised countries in return for compliance at Copenhagen instead of insisting that those industrialised countries reduce their greenhouse gas emissions. Thu, 08 Oct 2009 14:19:17 +0000 http://www.chinadialogue.net/article/summary/3274#comment-9403 http://www.chinadialogue.net/article/summary/3274#comment-9403