Soil, Solutions, and Communituy

August Newsletter | Read the full Global Biochar Industry Update

It feels good to be back with you after welcoming a new little one into my family. While I was on maternity leave, it appears the IBI community has been as active and inspiring as ever! 

We’ve just released IBI’s 2025 Impact Report. Have you read it yet? We wrote about what we did, how we did it, and what’s to come. In this year’s edition, I designed a graphic that explains how biochar connects with the 17 United Nations Sustainable Development Goals. I knew biochar was awesome already, but after this exercise, I’m even more floored about everything that biochar can do. From climate action to food security, clean energy to healthy soils, biochar’s potential to create co-benefits across so many global priorities is something I find deeply hopeful.

Feel free to use this graphic in your own communications about biochar’s benefits! We’re stronger together. 

As this newsletter lands, our Wales Biochar Study Tour is underway! Attendees are exploring hands-on learning of biochar applications with site visits to companies like Black Bull Biochar and Carbon Hill , and a mini UK Biochar Festival featuring kiln demos, farm walks, a biochar-filtered runoff swimming pool, and more. (I’m jealous…aren’t you?) 

This type of experience is just one of the unique programs we have planned for this year, because in 2026, IBI is celebrating its 20th anniversary! Can you believe it — 20 years of biochar innovation and community building? We’re officially kicking off IBI on Tour, a collection of events, stories, and more to celebrate two decades of progress and looking ahead to what’s next. Our next “on tour” appearances are bringing more biochar education your way; the India Biochar Academy and the Washington State Study Tour. 

Part of this 20th anniversary campaign, and one of the projects I’m stewarding, is a new online Community of Practice for IBI members. We hope to have it ready for you by October 2025. Think of it as a dedicated social space for biochar practitioners: a place to share resources, spark conversations, join working groups, and connect directly with others working in the field, all on one easy-to-use platform. Do you have ideas or dreams on what this could look like? Please reach out — I’m all ears! 

Looking forward to the impact ahead! 

With gratitude,

Lauren Boritzke Smith, Communications Lead