How chocolate could counter climate change

Name: Edible art: Chef Smita Grosse on how to make a fiercely delicious chocolate dinosaur
Uploaded: 2023-06-04T08:21:51.000Z
Duration: 5 min 39 s
Description: Edible art: Chef Smita Grosse on how to make a fiercely delicious chocolate dinosaur

A process that heats cocoa husks dubbed ‘biochar’ locks in greenhouse gases and the final product can be used as a fertiliser, or in the production of ‘green’ concrete

One tonne of biochar – or bio coal – can stock ‘the equivalent of 2.5 to three tonnes of CO2’, said CEO of Circular Carbon

Reading Time:3 minutes

Why you can trust SCMP

A process that heats cocoa husks dubbed ‘biochar’ locks in greenhouse gases and the final product can be used as a fertiliser, or as an ingredient in the production of ‘green’ concrete. Photo: Shutterstock

Agence France-Presse

Published: 4:21pm, 4 Jun 2023

At a red-brick factory in the German port city of Hamburg, cocoa bean shells go in one end, and out the other comes a black powder with the potential to counter climate change.

The substance, dubbed biochar, is produced by heating the cocoa husks in an oxygen-free room to 600 degrees Celsius (1,112 Fahrenheit).

The process locks in greenhouse gases and the final product can be used as a fertiliser, or as an ingredient in the production of “green” concrete.

While the biochar industry is still in its infancy, the technology offers a novel way to remove carbon from the Earth’s atmosphere, experts say.

05:39

Edible art: Chef Smita Grosse on how to make a fiercely delicious chocolate dinosaur

According to the UN’s Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change (IPCC), biochar could potentially be used to capture 2.6 billion of the 40 billion tonnes of CO2 currently produced by humanity each year.

Select Voice

Choose your listening speed

Get through articles 2x faster

1.25x

250 WPM

Slow

Average

Fast

00:0000:00

1.25x