Hey folks… In the process of making charcoal last night to be used for Biochar, one of my emply 3 gallon Vivosun grow bags ended up in my inground fire pit and burned up ~90% before I could remove it.
Is this load of charcoal contaminated (ruined), or is it still safe to use? Here is the basic info on the bags:
Please advise
-Jim
Unless there are heavy metals in the material, anything toxic is up in the atmosphere now. If there are heavy metals, you shouldn’t be using them as grow bags anyway.
Also, do you have an open fire, or a closed container? If you’re burning in an open fire pit, you’re making ashes and not charcoal. Most of your material floats away as smoke and CO2.
Thank you!
They shouldn’t have any heavy metals…as you said, I wouldnt use them if they did.
Open, but in a pit. Plenty of charcoal, atleast given the my current options. Some pics below. Currently, screening the final size 1/4 or less.
Believe it or not, that’s not actually charcoal. You need a low-oxygen environment to make charcoal. You can either put your material in a sealed drum (with a small exhaust vent) and build a fire around that, or you can start your fire in the pit and mound it with soil, leaving a hole for smoke to escape. What you made will still help your soil, but it’s not technically charcoal.
Understood. I started the fire at the bottom of the cone pit and kept adding woods just as it stayed to ash. Once I ran out of cut wood, I put it out. I then separate the “glassy” sounding chunks that break easily and return the rest to start the next feed pile. Just following along from the online instructions to make Biochar at home. I don’t want to built a retort or fancy oven so I just mocked up the Kon Tiki kiln design as it was simple other a lot of digging. 
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So again, that non-BPA, bag shouldn’t be an issue correct?
I have made a lot of biochar using a similar trench method. That biochar will work fine.
The bag you burned is in the atmosphere now.
Thanks for the additional thoughts…I really do what I can to keep it as clean ‘organic’ as I can.
There are people who say the opposite, biochar and charcoal have opposite definitions the only thing clear is cinders, an no one says that
There certainly will be worse stuff in your soil… like precipitated chemtrails.
You mean Atmospheric Seasoning? lol
