Posts & Updates

More than a decade ago now, renowned soil scientist Wim Sombroek (1934-2003) brought to light the impressive performance of dark soils in the Amazon Basin. He along with fellow early scientists Johannes Lehmann, Dirse C. Kern, Bruno Glaser, William I. Woods among others help to establish the potential of what we now know as biochar. […]

  The Sonoma Biochar Initiative (SBI), in partnership with Southern Sonoma County Resource Conservation District as lead applicant, recently submitted an application for federal funding under USDA Natural Resources Conservation Service’s Conservation Innovation Grant program.  The proposed project features a launch of biochar production from local biomass, field trials with local farmers, and education and […]

In a recent letter to Assemblymembers Perez, Blumenfield, Gordon and Feuntes and Senators Steinberg, Leno, Simitian and Kehoe, initiated by CalCAN, the California Climate and Agriculture Network, the Sonoma Biochar Initiative (SBI) urged that biochar, a climate response tool and a material to benefit agriculture, be considered for investment under the cap-and-trade fee revenue that […]

The Sonoma Biochar Initiative (SBI), in collaboration with Dr. Cecile Girardin of the UK Big Biochar Experiment, the Sonoma Valley High School Earth Club, The Sonoma Ecology Center, and Sonoma Compost Company, is spearheading a Biochar Citizen Science Project to gather data on the use of biochar in local gardens. You can check out out […]

We’d like to welcome two new members to the Sonoma Biochar Initiative: Benjamin Colby of Swallow Valley Farm and Charles Berkstresser of TragaLuz. Thank you for supporting our efforts to educate Sonoma County residents and promote use of biochar to build healthy soils and redirect carbon.

11.5 tons of biochar was delivered to the Sonoma Biochar Initiative this cold, December morning. The char is being stored in Sonoma courtesy of Sonoma Materials, whose generosity in giving us the storage space we want to publicly thank, and whose talented forklift operators unloaded the truck in what must have been less than 15 […]