Business leaders urge Government to back Drax's £2bn carbon capture plans

Among the signatories to the letter are the Association of British Ports and Peel Ports, as well as the Northern Powerhouse Partnership, the North and West Yorkshire Chamber of Commerce and the Hull & Humber Chamber of Commerce. Other backers include Mitsubishi Heavy Industries, the Carbon Capture and Storage Association and the Association for Renewable Energy and Clean Technology.

The Government is about to make its final decision about which carbon capture clusters will be shortlisted for its ‘Track-1’ process. Selected projects will receive Government support and access to a new pipeline due to be built across the region to collect captured carbon emissions and bury them under the North Sea.

New polling of 1,000 local residents commissioned by Drax has separately suggested 77 per cent of those questioned want the Government to back the company’s plans as part of net zero efforts.

Drax Power Station produces around 12 per cent of the UK’s renewable electricity, by burning biomass fuel, which is mainly wood pellets imported from North America. But there have been increasing questions over how ‘green’ the energy is.

Drax hopes to start the world’s largest bioenergy with carbon capture and storage (BECCS) project which would remove greenhouse emissions from the atmosphere that are produced by burning the fuel.

The company says that if the scheme gets the go-ahead, it could capture eight million tonnes of CO2 per year and create thousands of jobs.

Drax plans to invest £2bn in the process. But last year, environmental campaign group Zero Hour suggested billions of taxpayer spending would be required to support BECCS projects and also highlighted warnings from the European Science Academies organisation which has said “many scenarios for BECCS assume that unrealistic quantities of biomass will be available” to make the process work.

During the Tory leadership campaign, now Prime Minister Rishi Sunak said he was “excited” by the Drax proposals.

Andrew Percy, Conservative MP for Brigg and Goole, said today the Drax plans have “will support and create good jobs locally, and also secure millions of pounds of investment in the local economy”.

Will Gardiner, Drax Group CEO, said: “Yorkshire’s voters have a clear message for Government: back Drax’s plans for BECCS at Drax Power Station. We stand ready to invest £2bn in North Yorkshire to create the world’s largest carbon removals project but we need support from Government in the upcoming Track-1 announcement. If the Government does not continue at pace in investing in and supporting renewable power and carbon removal technologies, it risks investment moving to other countries.”

The Department for Business, Energy and Industrial Strategy was contacted for comment.