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Blue Dot: An innovative solution to removing and storing carbon: biochar and bio-oil with Charm Industrial

Bio-oil produced from biochar by Charm Industrial.
Charm Industrial
Bio-oil produced from biochar by Charm Industrial.

Host Dave Schlom explores the world of biochar and ways to remove carbon from the landscape with Pyrolysis engineer Joe Polin and policy expert Nora Cohen Brown from Charm Industrial.

The San Francisco-based company has a research and development operation in Colorado that is pioneering a method to take biomass from farms and forest litter, turn it into biochar through the process of pyrolysis.

Charm is taking that biochar and turning it into an oil that can then be injected into old oil wells to remove it permanently from the biogeochemical cycle. It's a promising solution for getting carbon off the landscape and fighting the deleterious effects of human-caused climate change.

Dave Schlom is the longtime host and creator of Blue Dot. From surfing to Voyager in interstellar space, rock guitar to orcas in our imperiled oceans, the topics on Blue Dot are as varied as the host’s interests and connections -- which are pretty limitless! An internationally respected space history journalist, Dave is also deeply fascinated by all aspects of the grand workings of nature’s awesome machinery on scales ranging from galactic to subatomic. And topics take in all aspects of the arts and sciences.
Matt Fidler is a producer and sound designer with over 15 years’ experience producing nationally distributed public radio programs. He has worked for shows such as Freakonomics Radio, Selected Shorts, Studio 360, The New Yorker Radio Hour and The Takeaway. In 2017, Matt launched the language podcast Very Bad Words, hitting the #28 spot in the iTunes podcast charts.