Activists can screw up anything. No matter how good the idea, or how important the subject, once some activist organization decides to exploit the issue it all turns to crap.

Carbon-negative bioenergy is the most radically green energy concept, because all other renewable technologies are carbon-neutral at best, slightly carbon-positive in practise.

Radical green is not a valid reason for anything. Carbon-negative bioenergy is a good idea because it is potentially cheap, abundant and, for the pyrolysis method, provides valuable inputs to agriculture. It makes sense without climate hysteria, and will still make sense once that fever has passed. It's good independent of any fashion claims or political exploitation.

Biopact has always been surprised to see that other organisations, claiming to take the climate fight serious, have not heard of the concept or haven't been willing to take it serious. This is now changing, at last.

The reason for this change is a recent paper [*.pdf] by NASA's James Hansen, who is perhaps the most authoritative voice on where humanity should aim with its GHG reduction efforts.

This is pure gibberish. Hansen is not an authority on "where humanity should aim with its GHG reduction efforts". He has zero expertise on the subject. His skill set has to do with climate science, not economics, sociology, politics or any of the other sorts of expertise that provide policy input.

Geo-engineering techniques to capture atmospheric CO2 are not feasible because too risky or too costly. Hansen therefor lists four broad alternative priorities that should be implemented simultaneously to achieve the 350ppm target. Two of those are the production of 'negative emissions energy': (1) a moratorium on coal without CCS, (2) reforestation in the tropics and avoiding new deforestation, (3) coupling biomass to CCS (something Biopact has been advocating for a long time), and (4) initiating biochar projects on a large scale, possibly beginning with a transition from slash-and-burn to slash-and-char.

What are these folks smoking! Geoengineering is risky and costly but a moratorium on coal is not? Who will pay for all of this, especially in growing economies such as China where coal use is large and growing at a blistering pace? Who will force tropical countries to manage their forests, presumably even eliminating the biofuel plantations?

Pyrolysis systems have little to do with climate hysteria. They are in fact carbon negative, but that's a secondary effect. It is the value of the carbon in soil that is primary, a correction for eons of soil abuse by cultivation, and arguably a far more important issue than climate change since it is the productivity of the soil that feeds, clothes and provides a great deal of energy for us. The soil must first produce biomass before the climate nutters have anything to work with for bioenergy. It is of first importance.

The place to promote the use of biochar is in agriculture, not climate politics. Improved agronomic systems that include not only the use of biochar but also improved seed and limited tillage would produce more biomass with fewer inputs, and so both geo-sequester carbon and reduce carbon based or derived inputs inputs such as fuel and fertilizer.

Producing more biomass is the primary need in a world with a growing population. You can work your way around to understanding this in a crab-wise fashion by thinking of it as energy efficiency: making better use of the sunlight that falls on the planet. It's the ultimate solar power hack. Making more effective use of fresh water is also a solar power hack since rain is a result of insolation as well. Escaping the climate change/emissions mental rut is a prerequisite to formulating good policy and making meaningful decisions. It's important. We can't afford to cripple agriculture while pursuing half-baked climate related political scams.