Date: July 23, 2009 (Thu.) 9：30～11：00
Venue: Room 331, Inamori Foundation Memorial Hall
Presentation:
Mr. JOKO SULISTYO (RISH,Kyoto University)
【Summary】
An improvement of traditional charcoal is necessary in order to meet the requirements of charcoal properties for the development of engineering materials. The status of charcoal in Indonesia can be considered from the perspectives of energy uses, providing job opportunities, giving income and contributing to cleaning up the environment. Additionally, charcoal currently has been receiving a great deal of interest for engineering applications. The development of charcoal for engineering materials should utilize biomass residue from forest plantations and crop estates. The strategy for the utilization of traditional charcoal for engineering materials is to first give additional heat-treatment on the traditional charcoal in order to improve its characteristics and, second to introduce a better charcoal kiln.
【Record of Activity】
In the development of the carbonization process to improve the properties of traditional charcoal, it is necessary to meet the requirements of engineering applications, it is expected that several by-products such as smoke, liquid, tar, etc, will also produced. Therefore, the carbonization process will give maximal benefits to the local people and to potential consumers in the industries that use carbons as raw material. Up to now, the development of carbonization by introducing the improved charcoal kiln to local people has not been successful due to the lack of expectation of opening and assuring the market. Most of the traditional charcoal makers still prefer to take traditional methods with lower capital requirements and sell their products at the local market.
Actually it is difficult to establish the connection between advanced and local technology in the engineering material development from traditional charcoal. There are two ways in which charcoal, which is appropriate for engineering applications, can be provided. First, the traditional charcoal is collected from local people and then the industrial user conducts additional heat treatment by using pulse current technology which is carried out a heating rate of 250 ºC/min up to 700 ºC. The heat treatment is conducted at 700 ºC for a few minutes. Heat treated charcoal is suitable for the production of carbide ceramics. Secondly, the improvement is done by introducing a better and new charcoal kiln which also produces by-products. It is expected that the charcoal produced is appropriate for these requirements. These strategies are also to be implemented in other developing countries, since there are similarities in the traditional charcoal methods.
Charcoal in Indonesia is produced by large scale enterprises, as well as the production by small scale traditional charcoal makers. The large scale enterprises commonly use mangrove wood as their raw material and produce bulk charcoal for special purposes such as for barbeques, etc. Mostly the charcoal is sold overseas. However, the reforestation of mangrove forest is difficult, thus causing a decrease in mangrove forest resources after they have been exploited for charcoal production over the last decade. Therefore, in the future, it is expected that the large scale enterprises will become interested in the development of advanced material from charcoal by using biomass residue.
From the view point of forest resources, the sustainability of forest management has to be considered in the utilization of biomass residue. Therefore, the utilization of biomass residue should not reduce the forest resources. This can be managed by using the residue limits on the biomass growth in the forest or crop estates.
( Toshimitsu Hata)