Bill HIlgendorf

Director of Sustainability and Biochar Research

White Feather Farm

State: NY

About

Trained as an industrial designer, Bill became interested in discarded items and materials at a young age, always thinking about ways they could be fixed or modified to bring a new function or purpose to them. Much of his career has focused on upcycling and telling the story of a material through the design and process of creating something new and functional. When Bill shifted his focus more clearly on the climate crisis and learned about biochar, something clicked. Not only are you able to utilize vast amounts of residue and waste that left alone become a carbon liability, but through the process of pyrolysis you can convert that waste to a stable carbon that will persist for a millennium and can be used to help rebuild soils, suck up toxins and decarbonize the built environment. In many ways biochar represents the ultimate upcycled material.