Cooking Clean and Green
<How to Make Corncob Charcoal (1): With an Electric Briquettor>
Let’s look at how they make charcoal out of corncobs!
First, put some corncobs in a drum. Next, burn and carbonate the corncobs. It takes about 1 hour until they are carbonated. While you are waiting, you can prepare cassava starch. If cassava powder is not available, you can use corn powder instead. After the corncobs are carbonated, put the cassava powder into boiling water, mix it with the carbonated corncobs, and stir it thoroughly. After that, as photo (7) shows, put it all in the briquettor and press the molds. Then, you will get charcoal briquettes. Lastly, put the briquettes on the net and dry them under the sun thoroughly.
(1) Put corncobs in the drum.
(2) Burn and carbonate them.
(3) Carbonated corncobs
(4) Prepare cassava starch.
(5) Mix it with corncobs.
(6) Stir it.
(7) Put it in the briquettor
(8) Press the molds.
(9) Sun-dry the briquettes.
<How to Make Corncob Charcoal (2): Without an Electric Briquettor>
You may say, “We don’t have a briquettor,” or “We don’t have enough money to buy a machine.” Before you say that, why don’t you look around your community? You might be able to find alternative resources to an electric briquettor. In the Philippines, St. Paul University has been piloting manual production of corncob charcoal, having substituted some available resources at hand in place of an electric briquettor. They invented a briquettor made of bamboo as shown below. Bamboo tubes can be used as molds. Also shown in the pictures below, Styrofoam containers and empty cans can also be used as molds. Thus, you can bear charcoal with available resources just around you. Let’s BEAR!
<Electric Briquettor>
<Bamboo Briquettor>
<Empty Cans>
<Stuff charcoal and press it.>
<Styrofoam Containers>
<Poke it out from the molds.>
<Where is the Market? Who are the Customers?>
The group sells corncob charcoal in their community, for example to street vendors, restaurants, households, and blacksmiths. Since corncob charcoal is cheaper than wood, they can reduce the cost of cooking and metal-casting. Thus, corncob-charcoal making is contributing to the improvement of the community and the preservation of the natural environment. For every ton of “green” charcoal produced, 88 trees are saved. How wonderful it is!
“We are empowering our community with corncob charcoal!”
