ABSTRACT
The chapter strives to present an overview of important issues which currently affect the charcoal business. To illustrate matters, two fundamentally different markets and production environments were chosen for analysis, that is, the charcoal markets and industries of sub-Saharan Africa and Europe. In Africa, for large parts of the population, charcoal is the most important cooking fuel. Charcoal production and consumption are huge and likely to increase in the decennia to come. This has raised doubts about the sustainability of charcoal production on the continent. The chapter goes into the biomass resources which are used for charcoal production. Alternative resources are identified and evaluated. Production technologies are described and technical, economic, and ecologic issues of the different methods are considered. Attention is paid to the prospects of charcoal briquette production in sub-Saharan Africa, and a potentially beneficial alternative
application of charcoal, that is, replacement for petroleum fuels in small-scale power production at isolated sites, is briefly discussed. In the section which looks into the future of the charcoal industry in Africa an alternative to the prevailing fragmented, inefficient, and unsustainable charcoal value chain is proposed. The section on charcoal production and use in Europe discusses the most important applications of charcoal on this continent. The major part of the charcoal which is sold is used for leisure cooking and grilling. This market is briefly discussed. Aspects of the charcoal markets for important industrial applications (in metal ore reduction and for activated carbon) are considered as well. Different proven production technologies for industrial lump charcoal and charcoal briquette production are described and their merits and limitations discussed. The section on the future of charcoal production and use in Europe discusses a number of market developments which ultimately may seriously alter the structure of the charcoal business on the continent. 14.1 IntroductionCharcoal is usually produced by a process known as slow pyrolysis-the heating of wood or other biomass in the absence of oxygen. Mankind has made and used charcoal from wood since prehistoric times. Stone Age people, in their cave dwellings, roasted meat on charcoal fires. Bronze and Iron Age artisans and craftsmen produced tools and weapons from metals extracted from ores through reduction by charcoal. In 1991 the mummy of an Ice Age man who lived around 3500 BC was discovered in the Tyrolean Alps. Among other things the man was carrying a birch-bark box filled with charred wood pieces wrapped in maple leaves. As the man did not carry a flint stone for starting a fire it appears that he may have carried smoldering charcoal instead [1]. From the Middle Ages in Europe charcoal was used as a reducing agent in iron production. Large-scale application resulted in massive deforestation in parts of England and Central Europe. Due to scarcity and high costs, in blast furnaces and forgeries it was gradually replaced by coke. Charcoal, however, is superior to coke because it contains no sulfur. Therefore, today in Brazil, charcoal from (eucalyptus) plantations is still used in the production of pig iron and quality steel.
