The Film

The Biochar Effect delves deeply into the complexities and promise of biochar — an ancient material, now made new again, formed through pyrolysis. It is Tree Media's love letter to human ingenuity: the story of fixing the legacy of our industrial civilization and advancing from a linear to a circular economy.

At a time when we face multifactorial threats across climate, food production, pollution, soil degradation, droughts and floods, biochar can play a huge role and be a formidable part of the solution. The world needs to know and understand biochar and the miraculous positive effects it can have — from carbon dioxide removal and waste reduction to soil support, water filtration, and industrial and municipal circularity.

Director's Statement

Over the past year, biochar has become an unexpected champion of mine. At first glance, biochar bears a striking resemblance to the pernicious fossil fuel industry: black to the touch, incinerated, dead. Traditional climate activists have rejected biochar merely because of this superficial proximity. But what actually is biochar?

It is a stable, carbon-rich material obtained through pyrolysis — a thermochemical conversion of biomass in a high-heat, oxygen-limited environment. This process binds the carbon to the material rather than burning and emitting it as CO₂ into the atmosphere. Pyrolysis is Greek: pyro, "fire," and lysis, "separating," "decomposing."

This black, light, lifeless, coal-like material is a phoenix rising from the ashes — blossoming a new era of innovation and unlocking the reversal of climate change in a completely new way. It is circular, local, agnostic, from the bottom up. Biochar is the world's first and only fully circular waste-to-value product that can be integrated on every level and in every aspect of our society. Ergo, I'm making The Biochar Effect.

— Mathew Schmid, Director