Drax calls for biomass subsidies

Britain's biggest coal-fired power plant – and thus one of the country's environmental headaches – could be transformed into a crucial renewable energy resource, its operator said yesterday, but only if government subsidies for such plants are increased.

Drax, which generated 6 per cent of the UK's total renewable power in the first half of this year through burning materials at its Yorkshire power station, said it had could have done much more if the plant was run at full capacity for biomass. But chief executive, Dorothy Thompson, said: "The level of financial support is inadequate to burn biomass in very large quantities at current market rates."