The substance, dubbed biochar, is produced by heating the cocoa husks in an oxygen-free room to 600 degrees Celsius.
According to the UN's Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change , biochar could potentially be used to capture 2.6 billion of the 40 billion tonnes of CO2 currently produced by humanity each year."We are reversing the carbon cycle," Peik Stenlund, CEO of Circular Carbon, told AFP at the biochar factory in Hamburg.
If the cocoa shells were disposed of as normal, the carbon inside the unused byproduct would be released into the atmosphere as it decomposed. The surprising substance's sponge-like structure boosts crops by increasing the absorption of water and nutrients by the soil. To make better use of the powerful black powder, Houben said other applications would need to be found. The construction sector, for example, could use biochar in the production of"green" concrete.