The outlook is increasingly promising for a biochar project in the Methow Valley that would convert logging slash and organic waste to biochar, with a $160,000 appropriation in the state budget for the next two years.
The goal of the project is to reduce wildfire risk by converting slash to biochar, which would be used as a soil amendment.
The funding – $80,000 in fiscal year 2022 and again in 2023 – is “provided solely for a grant to a nonprofit organization dedicated to supporting forest health restoration located in Okanogan County for work toward a biochar research and demonstration project and initial efforts toward full-size operation of an industrial-sized facility in the Methow Valley,” according to the budget approved by the Legislature last week.
A Methow Valley–based nonprofit called C6 Forest to Farm is in the permitting process with Okanogan County and the state Department of Ecology to operate a small pyrolizer as a one-year pilot project. C6 wants to test the concept that pyrolyzing biomass (wood chips and logging slash) beyond typical combustion temperatures in a nearly oxygen-free environment would process the wood without producing pollutants.
Funding for the one-year research project was championed by all three lawmakers for the Methow Valley, State Sen. Brad Hawkins and Reps. Keith Goehner and Mike Steele, all Republicans.
“I’m pleased to share that the biochar funding was preserved in the final operating budget. You’ll notice that C6 was not named specifically in the final budget,” Hawkins said in an email to the Methow Valley News. “Nevertheless, the language is pretty clear to provide funding to C6 based on the budget language.”
“We are honored and humbled to announce that, through the efforts of [our three legislators], Washington is fully funding our biochar research & demonstration project! It is hard to overstate what a boost this is for our scrappy little nonprofit,” C6 Treasurer Gina McCoy said in an email after the budget was approved.
The project would also test the optimal processing time and temperature for different types of trees – mainly Ponderosa pine and Douglas fir – and study the effects of adding different amounts of the carbon-rich biochar to soil for water retention and increased productivity, according to C6. The ultimate goal is to reduce the risk of extreme wildfire through forest-health treatments and the removal of small trees that aren’t commercially viable as timber, according to C6.
C6 has applied to Ecology for an air-quality permit. Ecology is still reviewing the application. The organization also applied to Okanogan County for a temporary-use permit.
The state funding will allow C6 to expand its research to determine more regional uses for biochar, McCoy said. The additional research will expedite completion of a business plan to secure funding for a full-sized biochar plant, she said.
“We now have a public trust to discharge that we take very seriously,” she said.
If all permits are approved, C6 hopes to start processing biochar in June, McCoy said.
