Following last week’s rebellious effort my mother has suggested I am a ‘firebrand’. Of course, she’s referring to ‘a person who is very passionate about a particular cause’ but, being a chemistry teacher, I’m more interested in the other meaning relating to a piece of burning wood. Last weekend on the smallholding we had our last evening around the firepit. Sitting with friends over a drink (or two) laughing and putting the world to rights whilst watching the flames flicker, the embers glow and the sparks rising into the air was medicine for the soul.
Controlled burn
The control of fire by early humans was a significant milestone in our evolution. Evidence suggests that Homo erectus may have used fire around 1 million years ago. Regular and systematic use of fire by modern humans is believed to have started around 125,000 years ago. Fire provided warmth, protection, and a means to cook food, which had profound impacts on human diet, behaviour, and our ability to migrate from eastern Africa across the globe.
Traditionally, the hearth serves as the heart of the home. It creates a central gathering spot where family and friends can come together, making it a symbol of warmth and togetherness. Hubster is my fire meister and we have a wood burner which provides much of the heat through the winter months.
Although humans have a long and continuing relationship with combustion, there is huge amounts of scientific evidence on the detrimental effect smoke particulates have on our health. In urban areas solid fuel stoves should absolutely have restrictions in place to avoid those lung-damaging pea soupers of yesteryear. Out here in the countryside, with no proximal neighbours or young children in the house, and with power cuts becoming more frequent due to the ferocity of storms bringing down power lines, we are often grateful for the wood burning stove. We are self-sufficient in fuel, coppicing willow and taking down occasional diseased or overcrowded trees to allow more growth.
Tinder dry
The news, even in the mainstream media, has been shocking over the past weeks with out-of-control fires in Portugal, Brazil and across central Africa. People have been using fire to manage farms for hundreds, even thousands of years, but that was before we decided to also burn fossil fuels like they might go out of fashion. Some groundcovers are dry as a bone and ready to ignite given the smallest spark. Shame we can’t use the flood waters from Storm Boris (who’s still causing devastation) to put out these infernos which have been devastating eastern Europe.
Wildfires are a feedback loop for climate change. Burning fuels releases carbon dioxide, that warms the atmosphere, that leads to drought, that leads to wildfires which releases more carbon dioxide, which leads to more fires…. and round and round the miserable roundabout we go.
Being of a certain age where joints and muscles start to creak, especially after some heavy gardening, Hubster and I attend a Pilates session once a week. One of the ladies lived in Greece for years but returned to England to retire. I have a repeating conversation with her about the wildfires that are ravaging the Greek countryside and the droughts that are causing the olive crops to fail.
Last week I had the gall to mention ‘climate change’. She promptly corrected me, “No! It’s not climate change, it’s arsonists” she declared. Now, call me a firebrand, but really? Did I miss something or are teachers actually responsible for delivering on Article 12 of the Paris Agreement? The responsibility to educate adults is at the feet of the government – I have enough on my hands trying to prepare children for their future.
Fire Alarm
We had some excitement this week in school. For the first time ever, I set off the fire alarm. We were talking about combustion reactions and the formation of oxides. The pupils used the Bunsen burners to burn small strips of magnesium ribbon, which glows with an intense white light. All safety precautions were followed; hair tied back; bags under the tables; standing up; goggles on; pupils told to watch the reaction through the corner of their eye. I wanted to demonstrate the effect of particle size, so scattered a few grains of magnesium filings in the flame, it’s the same element that is used in many sparklers. Awe and wonder abounded.
Pupil C, who sometimes struggles to stay engaged and on task, suggested I should put lots of magnesium filings in. I looked at the spatula, decided that it wasn’t too much, and enthusiastically threw them into the flame. A bright white flash, a cloud of smoke (magnesium oxide dust) and within a couple of seconds the fire alarm rang. A full school evacuation followed but fortunately we managed to instruct the fire service that it was not an emergency. According to a couple of pupils I am the GOAT, and the lesson was Fire – I had to look them up in my Gen Z slang dictionary. Slay.
Teaching children how to handle fire safely, how to put out different fires, about how different materials burn seems like it is rather more important than suggested by its relative absence in the national curriculum. However, I’m thrilled there is a full topic on ‘chromatography’ as that’s really useful to us as adults, isn’t it? Hands up who’s used it in the last 12 months. Anyone?
Carbon capture
There was a headline in the press last week “How farms are using magic dust to capture carbon”. It’s not magic, it’s science. Farmers have been adding basalt powder to soils for decades as it aids plant growth. Even in school, a few years ago we did a project with a local university.
The children added basalt to the soil in the veg patch and a real scientist explained that when it rains, the water droplets absorb small amounts of carbon dioxide from the atmosphere, when the rain hits the rock, a reaction occurs which solidifies the carbon and removes it from the atmosphere. Basalt is a by-product of the aggregate industry so using it to reduce the 1.5 trillion tonnes of carbon dioxide humans have released since the Industrial Revolution seems like a good idea.
Direct Air Capture
Meanwhile a new pilot Direct Air Capture plant near Lowestoft is nearing completion. It will cost £3,000 to capture each tonne of carbon dioxide and may be decommissioned after two years. Once the plant is operational by the end of this year apparently it will be capable of extracting 100 tonnes of CO2 from the atmosphere annually which will then need to be piped underground and stored.
I’m sorry but this does not seem to be a realistic solution. Some simple maths suggests 100 tonnes of CO2 a year with 1.5 trillion tonnes to remove if we want to get back to pre-industrial levels will take (quick maths calculation in my brain) lots and lots of years, or millions of new Direct Air Capture plants to even scratch the surface. Big yikes.
There is another alternative. It is estimated that 87% of all carbon captured and stored is through the use of biochar. Hubster is researching its production, use as a soil improver and application in climate mitigation. Biochar is a carbon-rich product made from organic matter through a process called pyrolysis, which involves heating the material in a low-oxygen environment. This process results in a lightweight, black residue that has applications in sustainable agriculture and environmental conservation.
Biochar
Biochar is porous so it retains water and nutrients to improve soil fertility and support beneficial microorganisms helping crops grow larger and faster. It locks away carbon in a stable form, preventing it from contributing to atmospheric CO2levels which makes it a valuable tool in the fight against climate change. The production of biochar utilises residues from agricultural and forestry operations, converting waste materials into a valuable resource. Biochar has also been used for centuries, notably by indigenous peoples in the Amazon to create fertile soils known as terra preta.
We can therefore fight fire with fire. So, how much funding does biochar get compared to the billions of subsidies for fossil fuels? I would say diddly-squat as it was a favourite saying in the Bird household, but I can’t even use it as it’s now a farm shop owned by a (ex?) petrol head. So, let’s just say it gets a teeny tiny iota of funding which really is a C+ at best (or level 4 in the GCSE grading system). It goes without saying that we still need to stop burning fossil fuels. No cap.
Note to self: Start trying to find newspapers to help the wood burner get going when we start to use it. They are becoming rather scarce in our newfangled technological age.
