to create a greener, more resilient Napa Valley

sustainable viniculture practices

Bridging wildfire defense efforts with

Napachar

to create a greener, more resilient Napa Valley

sustainable viniculture practices

Bridging wildfire defense efforts with

Napachar

to create a greener, more resilient Napa Valley

sustainable viniculture practices

Bridging wildfire defense efforts with

Napachar

Founded in Napa county, Napachar converts woody waste from vineyard management and local forest fuel-reduction efforts into Biochar, one of the richest soil amendments and most stable forms of carbon capture available today.

Why Napachar?

Currently in Napa and Sonoma, we offer place-based biochar production as a service to vineyard, orchard, and forest managers. We bring our portable biochar kilns to your burn piles, perform a smoke-free conversion of the biomass into biochar on-site, and leave behind the biochar produced, eliminating the need for transportation and allowing immediate integration into the soil for carbon sequestration.

Boost Vineyard Production

Vineyards are under constant pressure to perform a balancing act between striving for the best production of grapes possible and an ever-increasing need to maintain environmentally conscious practices. Particularly in the Napa region, vineyards must adapt to water use restrictions and fire-safety precautions. Biochar can help vineyards address these needs. When used as a soil additive, biochar serves as a sponge, holding onto water and nutrients, and encouraging a thriving microbiome of microorganisms. Biochar’s synergistic effects on soil health result in increased growth and crop production, with no loss in quality of the fruits. Further, as one of the most stable forms of carbon storage, biochar stays in the earth for 100s to 1000s of years; much longer than other soil additives, which eliminates the need for frequent reapplication.

Fire Defense Done Better

Recent wildfires have severely affected our local communities and fire mitigation/defensible space efforts are no longer just helpful, they are becoming mandated. Traditionally, the timber removed for this purpose is sold for lumber when possible, but inevitably a large portion is useless as lumber and is left in the forest to either be burned in piles or chipped and scattered on the ground. Napachar provides a better alternative across the board: a cleaner burn than burn piles (almost no smoke!), increased carbon capture (up to 50% captured, as opposed to otherwise releasing 100% of the carbon into the atmosphere), better long-term storage of the carbon (wood chips decompose and release the carbon in 5-10 years), and does not damage the existing forest floor or soil (burn piles and mechanical equipment leave completely dead soil in their wake).

Interested in learning more about the Science of what we’re doing? Check out the facts in our page on Biochar!

Why Biochar?

Get in Touch

© Copyright - Napachar