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TheManWithTheHat said:
Agar with activated carbon doesn't suffer from the addition, in fact, in more cases than not it benefits. Also, I doubt the activated carbon is going to absorb much water or nutrient. Nutrients are water soluble, however carbon is insoluble in water--meaning there should be no mixing of the two...

also... "Activated carbon is used for adsorption of organic substances and non-polar adsorbates and it is also usually used for waste gas (and waste water) treatment."

First and foremost, water and just about all of its solutes are polar. Therefore, the carbon should not adsorb them, instead only non-polar molecules which would probably more deleterious to the mycelium's health on average compared to polar molecules. I say that because mycelium is water-based like all other life, and therefore would be using more polar substances than non-polar.

Limiting nutrients are not going to be organic, they'll be inorganic like calcium and sulfur. Anything needed that's organic there will be plenty of, especially with grains.


My thoughts anyways...

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They are some impressive preliminary results.

Would be nice to see the increased yield that has been written about.

I found that old post by agar, +3 years ago.
Anyone use activated charcoal in there casing mix?

There is a new interesting link to this in there.

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Evaluating the addition of activated carbon to heat-treated mushroom casing for grain-based and compost-based substrates.

Mark A. Becharaa, Corresponding Author Contact Information, E-mail The Corresponding Author, P.H. Heinemanna, P.N. Walkera, A. Demircia and C.P. Romaineb

Department of Agricultural and Biological Engineering, 249 Agricultural Engineering Building, The Pennsylvania State University, University Park, PA 16802, USA

Department of Plant Pathology, 211 Buckhout Laboratory, The Pennsylvania State University, University Park, PA 16802, USA
Received 26 January 2007;
revised 16 May 2008;
accepted 22 December 2008.
Available online 10 May 2009.

Abstract

Two substrates, a non-composted grain spawn substrate and a traditional composted substrate, each covered with peat-based casing that contained varying amounts of activated carbon (AC) and each receiving different heat-treatment durations, were tested for Agaricus bisporus mushroom production. The amounts of AC were 0, 5, 10, 15, and 20% v/v, and the heat treatments were 0, 60, and 180 min at 121 °C and 103.4 kPa. Overall, the addition of AC up to 10–15% of casing for a grain spawn substrate increased mushroom yield. However, the addition of AC to the casing for compost substrates had no significant effect on yield, whereas heat-treating the casing increased yield. The onset of fruiting was retarded in grain spawn treatments not receiving AC with heat-treatment durations of 60 and 180 min, whereas this effect was not as apparent for the compost substrates. On average, mushroom yield was greater for the grain spawn substrate (366 g) than for compost substrate (287 g). For grain spawn substrate, the results show that the addition of AC ranging from 5% to 10% was adequate for maximum mushroom production.

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Looks like there is a lot of charcoal posts, for example all the related posts at the bottom of this page.
Just hasn't caught on as far as I know, I could have been doing it all this time.