What is Sumatran Flood Wood For?

Former Minister of Maritime Affairs and Fisheries (KKP), Susi Pudjiastuti, urged President Prabowo Subianto to evaluate and halt the timber industry if it turns out that state revenues from the sector are not commensurate with the environmental damage and human lives lost. The devastating floods in Sumatra (Aceh, North Sumatra, and West Sumatra), which killed thousands of people, have captured national and even international attention. The government must elevate the status of the disaster to a national disaster so that the causes, perpetrators, impacts, and future anticipation can be identified. Without an elevating status, the problem will not be adequately addressed and foreign aid will be reluctant to enter. The perpetrators who caused the natural disaster, including the makers of the policies that supported it, must be investigated and prosecuted.

And that's not even counting other material losses, such as the destruction of infrastructure, homes, and so on. This tragic and heartbreaking situation would not have occurred if forests had been properly protected. When forests are cleared for palm oil plantations without adequate consideration and calculation, or solely for profit, the price is thousands of human lives, as Susie Pujiastuti noted. The timber from land clearing for palm oil plantations is so abundant that it becomes a source of significant profits.

Indonesia is currently the world's palm oil king with production of more than half (50%) of the world's palm oil or around 50 million tons of palm oil / CPO per year and the demand for palm oil continues to increase as the world's population continues to need a supply of vegetable oil (for food and biofuel). Palm oil is the world's largest vegetable oil production, beating other vegetable oils such as soybean oil, sunflower oil and canola oil. Palm oil with soybean oil, sunflower oil and rapeseed / canola oil are the four main vegetable oils in the world, where producing countries compete with each other (read: trade war) to market their vegetable oil products. The advantage of palm oil is the highest productivity of palm oil among other vegetable oils or the most efficient among the four most consumed vegetable oils in the world. For comparison, to produce 1 ton of palm oil requires 0.25 hectares, while to produce 1 ton of soybean oil requires 2 hectares, then 1 ton of sunflower seed oil requires 1.43 hectares and production of 1 ton of rapeseed / canola oil requires 1.25 hectares.

Another advantage is that palm oil tree cannot grow in subtropical countries like Europe and North America, so this should be a blessing for Indonesia, not a disaster. This is despite the fact that they are not native to Indonesia but originate from West Africa. With an area of ​​nearly 17 million hectares, Indonesia is the owner of the largest palm oil plantations in the world and a significant source of foreign exchange for the country. However, efforts to boost palm oil production through extensification must not ignore the aspects of safety and environmental sustainability. This extensification can even be slowed down through a number of intensifications, one of which is the application of biochar. For more details, read here.

The sustainability and deforestation aspects are 2 important points especially for a number of European countries to assess plantation products, especially palm oil and even the EUDR (EU Deforestation Regulation) will be implemented in about 1 year or fully effective January 1, 2027. But unfortunately, these European countries apply double standards because palm oil is treated very strictly even with various layered regulations, but this is not the case with other major vegetable oils, namely soybean oil, sunflower oil and rapeseed / canola oil.

The Sumatran floods recently demonstrated a haphazard policy (out of the bounds of sustainability) that was then exposed by the disaster. Land clearing resulted in a massive amount of logs. The abundance of logs created a seemingly endless island of logs, but they also polluted the environment and disrupted mobility. The losses caused by the floods were so great that they formed a seemingly endless island of logs due to the sheer size of the piles. One of the post-flood measures is clearing these logs. Some of these logs have high economic value and can therefore be utilized. Of course the profits from the sale of these logs are given to the people affected by the disaster caused by the indiscriminate logging. This distribution helps accelerate post-disaster recovery.

Technically, the wood needs to be selected based on its type, size, and market potential. Meanwhile, wood that is less economical or considered waste, such as because it is too small, broken into small pieces, split, and so on, can be used for biomass fuel, such as wood pellet production. The production capacity of a wood pellet factory is adjusted to the volume of waste, market demand, and investment in the factory's production machinery. The location of the wood pellet factory should also be close to the raw materials and not far from the export port. Several treatments, such as washing, are necessary because the wood is dirty and muddy. Similarly, wood submerged in the sea can potentially increase its chlorine content. Besides wood pellets, other biomass fuel products that can be produced include wood chips and wood briquettes. Market readiness is crucial in selecting biomass fuel products to be produced.

Biomass fuel production from flood wood waste is certainly not sustainable. Although the volume of wood waste is mounting and will only be depleted in a few years, consideration must be given to continuing to produce sustainable raw materials, especially after the flood wood waste is gone. Bare lands need to be reforested, as do critical and even idle lands. Appropriate plant selection and land mapping are essential. To sustain the production of biomass fuels such as wood pellets, energy plantations need to be established on suitable land. Energy plantation plants such as calliandra and gamal/gliricidia have taproots, making them useful for controlling erosion and landslides. In fact, within a certain area, these energy plantations can generate hundreds of trillions in revenue; for more details, read here. Likewise, other production forests, which produce wood for various industries and purposes, must also be managed properly to be a blessing, not a disaster. 

Replanting Palm Oil Plantations and Utilizing Old Palm Oil Trunks Waste (Presentation Version)

Aging plants are one factor in declining palm oil productivity. Palm oil trees begin to decline in productivity after 20 years and need to be replaced after 25 years. Therefore, rejuvenation or replanting must be carried out periodically according to the age of the trees.

Furthermore, the demand for palm oil continues to grow in line with global population growth. For the domestic market, biofuel use takes the form of a mandatory 40% palm oil blend in biodiesel (B40) this year, which is being reviewed to increase to 50% (B50) by 2026, and a 3% blend for jet fuel by 2026. Demand for the international market also continues to grow. The main destinations for Indonesian palm oil are India, China, Pakistan, Bangladesh, the United States, the Netherlands, Spain, Italy, Egypt, and South Africa.

Replanting palm oil plantations is crucial because it maintains sustainable palm oil productivity and prevents or reduces deforestation for new lands. The potential volume of old palm oil trunk waste generated is enormous, and there are numerous utilization options, including bioenergy, biocarbon, biomaterials, biofuels, and biochemicals.

To read and access the presentation, please download here. 

Palm Oil Replanting Movement and Utilization of Biomass Waste

Palm oil trees begin to lose productivity after 20 years and need to be replaced after 25 years, while new trees take about four years to begin bearing fruit. This generally renders the land unproductive during this four-year period, which discourages farmers from replanting their palm oil. However, intercropping during this period can still provide benefits for farmers. Planting short-term crops like upland rice and corn alongside palm oils can help farmers earn additional income while the palm oils bear fruit and mature.

In 2024, Malaysia, the world's second-largest palm oil producer, began implementing land intensification due to limited land area, only replanting 2%, or approximately 114,000 hectares. This is despite the country's target of replanting 5% of its land. The situation in Indonesia is not much different, with replanting predicted to be less than 2%. For example, if only 1.5%, or approximately 246,000 hectares, are replanted, it would be disproportionate to the area of ​​its oil palm plantations, which is nearly three times Malaysia's. Furthermore, replanting should be carried out periodically every year to achieve optimal palm oil production performance.

The reluctance or slow pace of replanting has led to a decline in national crude palm oil (CPO) production. Malaysian palm oil production has even stagnated for more than a decade due to limited land for new plantations and slow replanting. Meanwhile, in Indonesia, concerns about deforestation have also impacted the expansion of new oil palm plantations. Crude palm oil (CPO) production will decline further if labor shortages and the spread of ganoderma fungus reduce yields.

Given the above conditions, the replanting of palm oil plantations must be encouraged to maintain or even increase palm oil production. The issue of biomass waste from palm oil trees, which cover thousands of hectares, also poses a challenge. With such a large volume of old palm oil trees, utilizing them for value-added products is crucial. With an average hectare of palm oil plantations containing 125 trees, each tree yielding an average dry weight of 2 tons, this yields 250 tons of dry weight of biomass per hectare. For 10,000 hectares, this yields 2.5 million tons of dry weight, and for 100,000 hectares, this yields 25 million tons of dry weight. An optimistic estimate would be that Indonesia could replant 5% of its land, or 820,000 hectares, for 205 million tons of dry weight of biomass. Similarly, Malaysia, with 5% replanting, or 285,000 hectares, would yield 71.25 million tons of dry weight.

Business readiness factors, both in terms of technology and the market or user base for the product, need to be carefully assessed. With such a large volume, biomass processing plants or industries can be established and operate optimally without worrying about raw material shortages. Products such as pellets, briquettes, and biochar are made from waste biomass from old palm oil trunks. Dead old palm oil trunks, often left abandoned on land, should be utilized to produce these useful, value-added products.

EUDR and Is It Time for the Palm Oil Industry to Consider Biochar ?

Malaysian smallholders cultivate around 27% of the total oil palm plantations or equivalent to 1.54 million hectares, while in Indonesia it reaches 41% or equivalent to 6.72 million hectares. Malaysia chose to increase the yield or productivity of FFB as an effort to increase CPO production, namely by being fostered by large companies with a target increase of 600,000 tons/year without increasing the land area. For Malaysia, opening new plantations is something that is very difficult, even impossible, especially with the implementation of the EUDR on December 30, 2024. Consolidation between palm oil farmers is expected to increase efficiency so that it ultimately increases yield and income. The area of ​​Malaysian palm oil plantations is around 5.7 million hectares or around 1/3 of the area of ​​Indonesian palm oil plantations (currently reaching around 17 million hectares). This is also the main reason why Malaysia chose to intensify its palm oil plantations while Indonesia tends to expand palm oil land, even though both countries face two main issues, namely increasing production and climate resilience.

Biochar application is a solution to overcome the two important issues above. Related to the increasing pressure of environmental issues, climate and sustainability, even renewable energy, it seems that biochar will receive more attention. There are many aspects of land and the environment that can be improved with biochar application which ultimately is a solution to the two main issues. For small plantations, biochar application can be easier to do, but for large plantations managed by various palm oil companies, biochar application requires more complex considerations, especially because of the risk factor of the vast area of ​​palm oil plantations, but this biochar option is still attractive. The use of IoT (Internet of Things) can be used to monitor biochar performance on the land, for more details, read here.

The operational efforts of the palm oil industry to be more environmentally friendly and efficient are a driving force and a challenge in themselves. With the large profits from the palm oil industry business, of course the palm oil industry will not simply ignore demands related to the environment and sustainability, especially the EUDR. Palm oil producers, especially Indonesia and Malaysia, are faced with a standard guideline that applies to countries producing 'edible oil', namely that palm oil to be exported must come from land that has been reforested before 2020. Otherwise, the producing country will be considered a country that does not pay attention to the issue of deforestation and hinders the export of palm oil abroad. Various lobbying and negotiation efforts by Indonesia and Malaysia as the two largest palm oil producing countries in the world to the European Union to be more relaxed in implementing the EUDR include great suspicion as to why rapeseed oil is not treated the same as palm oil. The production of rapeseed oil as a raw material for biofuel in Europe is protected and ignores its environmental impact.

Indonesia as a coconut island seduction country has an experience of coconut oil commodities in the past that can also be a reference for this. The era of the glory of copra or coconut oil was around the transitional decade of the 19th century to the 20th century or more precisely between the 1870s and 1950s and its peak in the 1920s. Why are copra and coconut oil in particular currently slumping and losing out to other vegetable oils? The long history of trade competition is the answer. Several parties, especially the American Soybean Association (ASA) accused coconut oil of being an evil oil containing cholesterol and saturated fat that clogs coronary arteries. The accusation was never proven true, in fact it was proven otherwise, but it became one of the main causes of the destruction of the global copra and coconut trade. The tropical oil campaign and war took about 30 years or in the 1950s to the late 1980s in the United States and so finally the Indonesian coconut industry slumped.

Climate factors in the form of efforts to reject deforestation with its EUDR and economic factors in the form of palm oil production will be a fierce feud but sooner or later it will definitely reach a meeting point that can be accepted by both parties because they need each other. Diverting CPO products to markets that do not require environmental requirements such as the EUDR also seems to be untimely. Furthermore, in the form of addressing two important issues in the palm oil industry, namely increasing production and climate resilience and in line with the EUDR, biochar is the right solution. The question is, will this biochar be an important consideration and even find its momentum to be applied in oil palm plantations, especially for Indonesia and Malaysia? And the implementation of the EUDR as its driving force. Let’s see.

Biochar as Deforestation Solution in Palm Oil Plantations and EUDR

The development of the palm oil industry and its plantations in Indonesia is very rapid, especially in the last 10 years and currently the area of ​​Indonesian palm oil plantations is estimated to reach 17 million hectares. As the largest vegetable oil producing plant in the world and the largest palm oil plantation area in the world, of course palm oil has a strategic value in the Indonesian economy. The average speed of Indonesian palm oil plantation area is 6.5% per year or equivalent to around 1 million hectares per year for the last 5 years, while the increase in palm oil fruit production or FFB (fresh fruit bunches) is only 11% on average.

Even the largest land expansion occurred in 2017, which increased by 2.8 million hectares. From 2015 to 2019, the total area of ​​palm oil plantations increased by 3.7 million hectares. The extensification or expansion of palm oil plantations has been widely "accused" and has become the focus of the world as a result of the conversion of forest land, resulting in a lot of deforestation to be converted into palm oil plantations.

Pressure from the European Union in particular, due to these conditions, has worsened the image of Indonesian palm oil, which in turn has affected the selling price of palm oil products, both CPO and its derivative products. Improving this image is also not easy. One effective effort is to stop the extensification efforts so that forest land remains forest land and does not turn into oil palm plantations. The European Union on Deforestation-free Regulation (EUDR), which will come into effect on December 30, 2024, as an effort to prevent deforestation, is also an important consideration. The regulation requires consumers and producers along the supply chain of certain commodities to conduct due diligence and risk assessments to ensure that their products do not contribute to deforestation. The EUDR also applies a tiered inspection and penalty system based on the level of risk perceived in the country of origin.

With the extensification of oil palm land of more than 1 million per hectare each year but the increase in oil palm fruit production is only 11%, it is certainly less attractive and must be avoided, especially with the world's spotlight on the increasingly rapid deforestation. This also increasingly indicates the low productivity of palm oil plantations. In fact, by improving soil quality, palm oil fruit productivity can be increased significantly and the opening of new land for the creation of palm oil plantations can be avoided. Biomass waste in palm oil plantations and in palm oil mills can be used for biochar production as a solution to this problem.

With the increase in productivity of fresh fruit bunches (FFB) with the use of biochar, new palm oil plantations do not need to be opened again. Assuming an average increase in productivity of 20%, CPO production will also increase by 20% or equivalent to 2 million tons. This increase will be equivalent to opening new land covering an area of ​​more than 2 million hectares. Of course, it is not a small area of ​​land. With a 20% increase in production, it is very likely that national needs for CPO in particular have been met and so too for the export market. Another advantage of using biochar is as a climate solution as carbon sequestration/carbon sink. So the two main problems in the palm oil industry in the form of increasing productivity and climate change resilience can be overcome at once with the application of biochar.    

Energy Plantations Energy Sources for All Time

 "Allah who makes fire for you from green wood, then you kindle (fire) from it." (QS. Yaasin (36): 80)

The sun was created by Allah SWT as the main source of energy for humans and living things on earth. It takes about 8 minutes for sunlight to reach the earth and is converted by plants into a food source so that it can be consumed by animals and humans. Humans also get food from animal sources. The more sunlight, the more can be converted by plants through the process of photosynthesis. Without the sun, plants die, animals die, humans die so that there will be no life on earth. Fossil fuels are essentially a source of energy from plants and animals in the past. Mining and use of fossil fuels will release a number of greenhouse gases (GHG) which increase the earth's temperature which at a certain level is dangerous for the earth's population itself. Efforts to overcome this are by using non-fossil energy and renewable energy so as not to contribute to increasing the concentration of GHG in the atmosphere which increases the earth's temperature.

From plants or trees can be directly used as a source of energy or fuel, namely firewood. Derivatives or energy products from plants are also very diverse and can meet all human needs, both energy in the form of solid fuels, liquid fuels and gas fuels. The production of firewood, wood chips, wood briquettes, sawdust, torrified biomass to charcoal are a number of solid fuel products. While the production of biooil, bioethanol, biodiesel, renewable diesel / green diesel, and bioavtur / bio jet fuel are a number of liquid fuels. And biogas and bio-syngas are gas fuels that can be produced from the original material in the form of plants.

A number of conversion techniques based on physics, chemistry and biology are needed for the conversion. The use of appropriate plant species is also needed to facilitate the conversion, for example for the production of solid fuels, biomass sources such as wood are needed, while if the target is liquid fuel, then the type of oil-producing plants that need to be pursued. Conversion from solid fuels to liquid or gas fuels can also be done but in general the longer and more complicated the process, the more expensive the production costs will be. But still, energy plantations are the basis for all of that.

Popular and fairly easy biomass processing is to make wood chips with size reduction then wood pellets and wood briquettes through biomass densification. Furthermore, to convert sugary biomass into ethanol with fermentation and azeotropic distillation, convert lignin biomass (lignocellulosic biomass) into ethanol with enzymatic hydrolysis reactions followed by fermentation and azeotropic distillation. Converting woody biomass into fuel with a thermal process can be burned directly or if you want to make charcoal, concentrate the fixed carbon, namely by pyrolysis or carbonization, and if you want to maximize liquid products / bio-oil / pyro-oil, namely by fast pyrolysis and if you want to maximize gas products, namely by gasification. And so that the characteristics of the biomass are like hydrophobic coal, the torrefaction or mild-pyrolysis process can be carried out. Torrefaction and densification are usually carried out together to optimize the biomass fuel product.

With gas to liquid (GTL) namely the gasification process and followed by the Fisher - Tropsch process, bio-ethanol, biodiesel and bioavtur / bio jet fuel can be produced. While from groups of plants that produce oil such as palm oil, biodiesel can be made especially with the transesterification or estran (esterification plus transesterification) process. Even used oil or used cooking oil / used cooking oil and miko (minyak kotor) / dirty oil or PAO (palm acid oil) can also be used for biodiesel / green diesel or further processed into bio-jet fuel / bio-avtur with the HVO / HEFA - SPK (Hydro-processed Esters and Fatty Acids-Synthesized Paraffinic Kerosene) process.

So basically, biomass from trees can be processed into various forms of energy or fuel needed by humans. In addition to being used directly as a heat source, this energy can also be converted into mechanical energy or electrical energy, for example biofuel-fueled vehicles to biomass power plants. So the source of energy throughout the ages stored in plants is this biomass as stated by Allah SWT in the verse above and there is no doubt whatsoever about it. Indonesia as a tropical country is a "heaven" for the production of biomass because of the rays of sunlight throughout the year and adequate rainfall and extensive land. The storage of energy in plants from sunlight is also likened to a battery that can be used anytime and anywhere for more details read here.

Another important thing to note for the creation of energy plantations or biomass plantations is the status of the land used. The land must not be from deforestation or land conversion (land use change) that damages the environment. Industrial plantation forests (HTI) that are in accordance with their designation can be used as energy plantations. In addition, biomass for producing energy can also be cultivated on critical land, or referred to as 'unproductive' land. The Indonesia Ministry of Environment and Forestry (KLHK) estimates that critical land in Indonesia in 2016 was 24.3 million hectares (Times Indonesia, 2017). This is a very large area, and overall Indonesia's territory is large enough to provide biomass for renewable energy production.

Is Palm Oil Land Expansion Still Needed?

The area of Indonesian palm oil plantations is currently around 15 million hectares, with CPO or crude palm oil production reaching 46.73 million tonnes in 2022. Indonesian palm oil producers are located in 26 provinces with the province producing the most palm oil namely Riau, followed by Central Kalimantan followed in second place, then North Sumatra. While the province that produces the least palm oil is the Riau Archipelago and above it are North Maluku and Maluku. The CPO product is processed into derivative or downstream products and part of it is exported. In general, the classification of CPO derivative products (downstream products) is grouped into, such as: oleochemicals, oleofood, and bioenergy.

The high demand for vegetable oil, especially crude palm oil or CPO, is driving efforts to expand oil palm plantations or extensification in Indonesia. But is this extensification really needed and the only way to increase CPO production? Meanwhile, permits issued for palm oil plantations have reached more than 25 million hectares as shown in the table below.

Biochar should be encouraged to use it rather than extensification of the land. The use of biochar will improve soil fertility and also make fertilization more efficient so that NUE (Nutrient Use Efficiency) increases, for more details read here. FFB production increase of 30% or more is possible with biochar. CPO production is estimated to increase by 30% to around 60 million tonnes annually. This is also equivalent to saving land reaching 5 million hectares. The problem of land disputes that reach hundreds of cases throughout Indonesia, land conversion, deforestation and so on can be overcome by using this biochar. Of course this should be a serious consideration for the intensification of palm oil plantations compared to the extensification of the land. Apart from that, a climate solution in the form of carbon sequestration / carbon sink can also be carried out simultaneously with the application of the biochar. Every 1 ton of biochar will store or reduce CO2 (carbon dioxide) in the atmosphere by approximately 3 tons. And the price of carbon credits from carbon removal is also increasing.

Become the Trendsetter of the World's Vegetable Oil Producers

In the vegetable oil market, there are 4 types of vegetable oils that are widely consumed around the world, namely soybean oil, sunflower oil, palm oil and rapeseed oil. Based on USDA data (2018) the total area of the 4 vegetable oil-producing plants in 2017 was around 208 million hectares. Soybean plantations have the largest proportion of area, namely 126 million hectares (61 percent), while the area of palm oil plantations is only 21 million hectares (10 percent). However, with an area of 126 million hectares, soybeans are only able to produce 56 million tons of oil or only 32 percent of the production of the world's 4 main vegetable oils. In contrast, palm oil with an area of 21 million hectares is capable of producing 73 million tons or 42 percent of the production of the world's 4 main vegetable oils.

The high level of palm oil production is obtained from the productivity of palm oil plantations which is much higher than the productivity of other vegetable oil producing plants. According to Oil World (2018), the average productivity of oil palm is 4.27 tons/hectare, while the productivity of other vegetable oil-producing plants is only 0.4 – 0.6 tons/ha. The productivity of palm oil is much higher, around 8-10 times compared to other types, making palm oil have a comparative advantage over other vegetable oils. This comparative advantage can be interpreted as saving deforestation in various regions of the world if palm oil is consumed by the global community or to produce the same amount of oil, the land needed for oil palm is 8-10 times smaller than other crops.

With an average annual productivity of 4.27 tons/hectare of palm oil or 17 tons of FFB/year, this is actually still quite low and productivity can be increased up to around 30 tons of FFB/hectare or 7.5 tons/hectare of oil. Increasing the productivity of palm oil is primarily by increasing soil fertility so that fertilization efficiency increases. Slow release fertilizer (SRF) is an efficient fertilizer that is economical and environmentally friendly. In addition, the use of biochar, apart from being a slow release agent in the fertilizer, will also improve soil quality or fertility by increasing soil porosity, providing organic carbon, raising soil pH, retaining water and nutrients so that they are more available to plants and as a medium for soil microbial colonies. By increasing the productivity of palm oil, followed by saving fertilizer due to increased efficiency, minimizing environmental pollution so that production costs can be reduced, it means that it is equivalent to increasing land efficiency by 76%. This means that the productivity of palm oil per year is 30 tons of FFB/hectare, or 7.5 tons/hectare oil and when compared to other vegetable oils it is 15 times more land-efficient or per tonne of palm oil requires 0.13 hectares while other vegetable oils require 2 hectares of land.

The climate solution in the form of carbon sequestration / carbon sink can also be done simultaneously with the biochar application. Every 1 ton of biochar will store or reduce CO2 (carbon dioxide) in the atmosphere by approximately 3 tons. Carbon credit from the application of biochar is a significant additional income apart from fertilizer efficiency and increased crop productivity, including palm oil yields. Moreover, the value of carbon credit tends to increase and the carbon (CO2) removal mechanism with biochar will become a trend in the future. The amount of income from carbon credit is proportional to the number of biochar applications in the oil palm plantation which will also be proportional to the area of the palm oil plantation.

The area of palm oil plantations ranging from thousands to tens of thousands of hectares owned by a company is common in Indonesia. This indicates the business potential that can be done. With the current area of palm oil plantations in Indonesia reaching around 15 million hectares, as much as 40% (6 million hectares) are smallholder plantations so that the company's plantation area is 60% (9 million hectares) which is divided into owned by Large Private Plantations (PBS), which is 8 .42 million ha (55.8%) and State Large Plantations (PBN) covering an area of 579.6 thousand ha (3.84%), for more details read here. Palm oil trees themselves can only produce well in the tropics because the temperature factor affects production through the rate of biochemical and generative reactions in the plant's body. To some extent, higher temperatures lead to increased fruit production. The temperature of 20°C is referred to as the minimum limit for generative growth and an annual average temperature of 22-23°C is required for continued fruit production. That is why not all locations on earth can be cultivated for palm oil even though the productivity of the oil is the largest compared to other plants, so that it becomes a comparative advantage in itself.

Meanwhile, from biochar production technology, it is also possible to reduce the use of solid fuels such as palm kernel shells (pks) which are commonly used in boilers at palm oil mills. Palm kernel shell which is a biomass fuel and used as boiler fuel in palm oil mills besides fiber (mesocarp fiber), can then be sold directly for both the domestic market (local) and the international market (export). The palm kernel shells can also be further processed into charcoal or activated carbon. The use of energy from biochar production technology (pyrolysis) will also increase the efficiency of boilers at palm oil mills, in addition to additional income from selling palm kernel shells or further processing. Becoming a trendsetter in the world's vegetable oil producers is very possible based on the reasons mentioned above. With Indonesia's current condition in particular, or other palm oil producing countries, with a little improvement, it is very possible to do this. Moreover, the palm oil industry produces a lot of biomass waste which is very potential as raw material for making biochar.

The Importance of SRF (Slow Release Fertilizer) With Biochar in Palm Oil Plantations

Biochar is not a fertilizer so even the nutrient content in biochar can be ignored. Even though there are a number of biochars that contain certain nutrients, this is a special matter and really depends on the raw materials used. Biochar is a soil amendment that functions to improve soil properties such as soil structure including increasing soil porosity/soil friability so that roots can penetrate deeper, soil aeration, water availability, shortening the age of harvest, inhibiting the development of plant pests and retaining nutrients and reducing soil acidity. Compared to other soil amendments which have weaknesses, including the need for large and continuous amounts because they decompose quickly, have the potential to negatively affect the climate, and introduce disease-causing microbes/pests, biochar has many advantages, including the volume required is not large enough, not continuous and able to survive in the soil (helps conserve carbon in the soil) is not decomposed for hundreds or even thousands of years. The above makes biochar can function to improve soil fertility and climate solutions (carbon sequestration / carbon sink) or an action to increase organic matter on agricultural land or plantations and mitigate the effects of climate change. 

Even so, biochar can be used to make fertilizer, namely slow release fertilizer (SRF). SRF is a fertilizer whose release is regulated to provide maximum growth effect or SRF is designed or modified fertilizer for controlled fertilization according to plant needs so as to provide increased use efficiency and at the same time increase yield or harvest. This is motivated by the low efficiency of fertilization so that even more is wasted than is utilized or low NUE (nutrient use efficiency). The function of biochar in SRF is as a slow release agent in the fertilizer because it has a porous structure. In making SRF, several methods can be used, including increasing the size (granulation, pellets, etc.), smoothing the surface of the fertilizer, mixing it with other materials that are difficult to dissolve (slow-release agent) and covering the fertilizer with certain materials so that the release of the fertilizer becomes slow (coating). The use of SRF is becoming popular to save fertilizer consumption, increase yields and minimize environmental pollution. 

Soil fertility is a complex trait or condition that must be kept optimal, especially regarding this fertilization. The component of soil fertility itself includes a number of things, namely the depth of the soil solum, soil structure, nutrient content, storage capacity, humus content, number and activity of soil microorganisms, and the content of toxic elements. Productive soils with high soil fertility, both naturally and/or due to human actions, are mainly due to the following characteristics: nutrients in the soil are mobile and easy to obtain, the ability of the soil to convert fertilizer into easily available forms, the ability of the soil to store nutrients dissolved in groundwater from the leaching process, the ability of the soil to provide a natural balance of nutrient supplies for plants, the ability of the soil to store and provide water for plants, the ability to maintain good soil aeration to ensure the availability of oxygen for roots, and the ability of the soil to bind (fix) nutrients and convert them into forms available to plants. Soil fertility must guarantee high, consistent and sustainable production.  

An understanding of the nutrient composition of fertilizer and its release mechanism will help make strategic plans to slow down the release of the fertilizer at a certain level. Compared to conventional fertilizers slow release fertilizer (SRF) has a very slow release speed which can be tens of times slower so that fertilization efficiency increases significantly. It is estimated that more than 50% of fertilizer is wasted due to various reasons including evaporation, immobilization in the soil and leaching due to water, for example due to rain or irrigation. This inefficiency of fertilization is not only detrimental from an economic aspect as well as the environment, namely making the soil acidic, killing soil microbes, and water-soluble fertilizers that can poison water that may be consumed by humans and animals.

Currently, developing countries use more than 60 million tons of fertilizer per year, while according to the Food Agriculture Organization (FAO) world fertilizer consumption reached 190.4 million tons in 2015. With this low level of efficiency, can be imagined how much fertilizer is wasted useless and only pollute the environment. Regarding SRF, the dose of biochar use must also be measured properly because the use of biochar that exceeds the dose will be useless. This is due to the hydrophobic nature of biochar, so that the excess dose does not or only a little can release the fertilizer slowly.

A number of parameters to be observed for administering biochar as SRF are the amount of FFB (fresh fruit bunch) production and its quality (yield of CPO, and its FFA content), continuity of fruiting throughout the year, and the level of uniformity of fruit maturity in one bunch. And it turns out that the use of biochar gave significant positive results, namely FFB production increased by more than 20%, fruit maturity uniformity was almost 100%, CPO yield was more than 25%, and FFA was only 2-5%. With the high production of FFB and the yield of CPO, the intensification of palm oil plantations should have been carried out rather than the extensification that was suspected of being an attempt to convert forest functions or deforestation which tends to receive negative attention from various parties. For more details, read here. There are still many things that can be optimized so that the palm oil industry is efficient, environmentally friendly and sustainable.

Tens of millions of tons of empty fruit bunches (EFB) at the palm oil mills are potential raw material for biochar production as well as tens of millions of hectares of oil palm plantations that can be used for biochar applications. In addition to overcoming the problem of biomass waste, biochar production also produces energy that can be used for the palm oil mill itself, in more detail, please read here. Compared to the production of fuel pellets from empty fruit bunches (EFB pellets) and the production of electricity from empty fruit bunches, the production of biochar has many advantages and advantages both economically and environmentally. In the end, modifying the fertilizer according to the use of the biochar will significantly increase the nutrient use efficiency (NUE) in the fertilizer, ensuring the effective circulation of nutrients and mitigating climate change with carbon sequestration.
 

Wood Pellet Stove for the Community

Wood-fired stoves are still commonly found in various regions in Indonesia. In addition to being inefficient, the stove also produces smoke pollution which pollutes the environment and is detrimental to health. Smoke pollution from wood-fired stoves is reported as the cause of death for millions of people in the world each year. In addition, many of the firewood used comes from forest wood which causes deforestation. While the further impact of deforestation is the occurrence of natural disasters such as floods and landslides.

Cooking is one of the important human activities to get food, so it is also important to be able to do well. Included as part of that effort is maintaining fuel sustainability, affordable fuel prices, health and environmental aspects. Currently, most of the fuel for cooking in Indonesia is LPG, but in reality, nearly 80% of the LPG used comes from imports or a value of around 60 trillion rupiah. Pertamina, as the sole producer of LPG in Indonesia, currently supplies tend to decrease. However, the demand for LPG continues to increase. LPG demand in 2011 was recorded at 4.35 million tonnes. This need continues to increase every year until it has doubled to 8.55 million tons in 2021. This condition is certainly not good, because it creates dependence on imports, even though in Indonesia there are a number of resources that can be used to overcome this.

Various things based on Indonesia's potential to overcome this include adding new oil refineries so that LPG production can be boosted, coal gasification to produce DME (Dimethyl Ether) whose characteristics are similar to LPG, or using natural gas with gas pipelines. From an energy independence standpoint, this can be done, especially since the raw materials are sufficiently available, but from a bioeconomic and decarbonization point of view (replacing fossil fuels with renewable energy), which is also increasing, this is not appropriate. Renewable energy should be as much as possible as a solution. Wood pellets are fuel or renewable energy from biomass which is ideal for substituting LPG. As a tropical country, Indonesia is rich in biomass because the sun shines all year round, whereas in sub-tropical countries when it's winter the plants stop growing. It can even be said that the biggest producers of biomass are tropical areas or areas where the equator passes, so as a gift from Allah SWT we must be grateful for it.

An efficient and low emission wood pellet stove is the best solution. Why not just a biomass stove? Why does biomass waste, especially wood waste, need to be processed into wood pellets first? By making wood pellets, in addition to uniform shape and size, dry, high density, it is also easy to store and use. Even in the rainy season it can be difficult to find dry firewood in a number of areas, on the other hand wood pellets can be very practical to use. So with standard products according to the specifications mentioned above, wood pellets will be a superior and renewable solid fuel, so that wood pellet stoves will work optimally. Meanwhile, if the fuel is from any biomass with various specifications, then the performance of the stove will not be optimal.

Raw materials for the production of wood pellets can use wood wastes from sawmills, wood processing industries and forest wastes. Many of these wastes have not been utilized and even polluted the environment to become useful and have economic value. The production capacity of the wood pellet factory also needs to be determined so that it meets the needs of its use. To meet the needs of the community at the village or sub-district level, a wood pellet factory can be built with a capacity of 500-1000 tons/month.

Regarding reducing CO2 in the atmosphere in line with decarbonization and bio-economy, a number of companies are currently also carrying out carbon projects, namely by making conservation forests as a medium for absorbing CO2 from the atmosphere (carbon sinks) by receiving compensation in the form of carbon credits. The conservation forest is maintained in such a way that the carbon project is a success. The occurrence of deforestation in conservation forest areas is something that must be avoided. To avoid this, the wood pellet stove program can be a solution. Communities around the conservation forest who use wood pellets for their cooking stoves make firewood no longer used and deforestation does not occur.