From NOT A LOT OF PEOPLE KNOW THAT
By Paul Homewood
h/t Ian Magness
Drax, once the UK’s dirtiest coal-fired power station, is set to stoke renewed controversy as ministers prepare to approve a multibillion-pound CO2 capture scheme it claims would make it “carbon negative”.
The scheme has infuriated greens already angered by Drax’s switch from coal to wood – burning eight million tonnes last year alone. They say Drax’s clear-cutting of forests in North America destroys the environment rather than supporting it.
Next week, however, Energy Secretary Claire Coutinho is expected to secure Drax’s future by approving a scheme to bolt two massive carbon capture plants onto Drax’s four generating units, potentially stripping out almost all their CO2 emissions.
Drax claims the scheme will allow it to remove more CO2 from the atmosphere than it produces – making it the world’s first carbon negative thermal power station. Greens claim it will destroy forests and cost consumers billions of pounds.
Ms Coutinho is also due to launch a consultation into how best to extend the subsidy system under which Drax last year received £617m from consumer bills. The scheme terminates in 2027 so Coutinho will propose extending it into at least the 2030s, keeping Drax in business for at least several years.
Schemes like Drax’s, known as bioenergy with carbon capture and storage, or Beccs, are highly controversial – green groups argue that cutting down forests to generate electricity destroys the environment rather than protecting it.
Drax produces about 4pc of the UK’s electricity so ministers are keen to protect it on energy security grounds too.
The idea underpinning Beccs schemes is that as plants and trees grow they capture CO2 from the air via photosynthesis.
If they are burned then that CO2 is released back into the air so there is no overall loss or gain. This means wood-burning on its own can be described as “low carbon”.
However, if the CO2 from burning wood is captured and permanently buried underground, as Drax proposes, then the process actually removes CO2 from the atmosphere permanently. This would make it “carbon negative”.
Such claims infuriate environmentalists and Drax’s plans have been opposed by Friends of the Earth, Client Earth and Ember. They say that despite changing from coal to wood Drax remains the UK’s largest single source of CO2 emissions at more than 13 million tonnes a year.
Tomos Harrison, an analyst at global energy think tank Ember, said: “UK energy bill-payers have already paid billions to Drax to burn wood for electricity, a practice which is unlikely to reduce the UK’s contribution to climate change and could actually be increasing it.
“Beccs is an unproven and controversial technology that cannot be guaranteed to deliver negative emissions and will cost bill-payers even more.
“Instead of continuing support for wood-burning in the UK we should be investing in wind and solar which bring down energy bills and make a genuine positive contribution to the UK’s climate change efforts.”
I can’t describe it better then the Greens – it’s doubling down on destroying virgin forests in North America, it’s massively expensive, and it may not even work.
Drax alone are talking of investing billions, and on top of that comes the costs of piping it all away to the North Sea. We already know that Carbon Capture plants require a lot of energy to work, meaning that much of Drax’s electricity will be wasted in the process.
Simply extending the existing subsidy schemes for another 15 years, which will the very least Drax will demand, will cost £10 billion. All of this will end up being added to our energy bills.
And for what? Even if it works perfectly, carbon capture will only save 4% of the UK’s emissions, some 15 million tonnes a year or so. A mere drip in the ocean of the world’s total emissions.
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Wouldn’t all fossil fuel burning devices be entitled to at least some carbon credits?? After all the whole world is about 20% greener than about 50 years ago due to all that biofood that engines put in the air – and let’s not forget the higher crop yields since then, yes due mostly to agricultural tech, but also in part to the higher CO2.
The cost in booster energy to convey power station exhaust gases to secure underground storage would require the output from another power station ad infinitum.
Apart from that what is the flowsheet and mass balance for this clearly impossible task C neutral task?
To convert a perfectly good coal fired power station and convert it to imported wood chip combustion is an act of madness. True an SO2 converter to SO3 ultimately producing synthetic gypsum could have been bolted onto the electrostatic precipitators removing fly ash – but nothing more than that. Demonizing CO2 is ridiculous as emissions do not contribute one iota to global warming or so called climate change.
Ed Davey the Liberal Democrat leader got a knighthood for his part in this insane scheme to convert Drax from a coal combustion station to one burning imported wood chips from North Carolina. Only the Liberal Democrats could come up with a crazy bizarre scheme such as this. He also went to assume as a coalition government minister that all sub post office managers were criminals rather than victims of a faulty IT accounting system adopted by the Post Office
Indeed.
“Drax claims the scheme will allow it to remove more CO2 from the atmosphere than it produces – making it the world’s first carbon negative thermal power station. Greens claim it will destroy forests and cost consumers billions of pounds.”
Removing “carbon” will destroy more forests. At least with clearcutting, stuff will grow back. But if the “carbon” in the atmosphere gets too low, growing back will be MUCH slower.
Drax can only be described as the “dirtiest” power station if you think CO2, a harmless trace gas essential to all life on Planet Earth, is “dirty”.
Carbon capture and storage is blatant nonsense on stilts. Burning American trees to generate electricity in Yorkshire is, if possible, even more stupid. Both those facts were pointed out to GangGreen campaigners and to Government, 20 years ago, but both had their fingers in their ears shouting “La la la, can’t hear you.”
So far as being “dirty” in any sense other than in GangGreen agit-prop, Drax is / was pretty good. When built it was the most modern coal plant in the UK and twice as big as most similar plants (4GW). It had the then state of the art dust precipitators and was retro-fitted with a full flue gas desulpherisation plant (leading to the closure of nearby Gypsum mines.) I have no doubt modern Ultra Supercritical plants are better.
But this incompetent, mendacious and malevolent article is a great example of the type of churnalism we see all day, every day. One day the idiots who publish this crap will be held to account.
No they won’t.
Unfortunately, true, Mike. But Martin Brumby has summarised it all succinctly.
It was then supposedly a good thing for Drax to move away from coal to trees. Now, that is just as bad a thing. (Worse, actually).
The green industry and it’s acolytes are stuck in the liar’s dilemma.
They have to tell more lies in order to prop up the previous lies.
It doesn’t end well on an individual human-interaction scale. But they can, and will, continue to get away with it.
They really don’t want us to have any energy. They’d rather 90% of us just die, but they’re unwilling to take the plunge themselves.
Never fear. The end game is to transition to wind and/or solar. Both being much cheaper and totally environmentally friendly. So sayeth the ‘scientists’. (Grifters in white coats!).
Once again – you just can’t make something like this up. Is anybody in power or the opposition sane? Albion, I cry for you.
“Is anybody in power or the opposition sane?”
Sane people (in relation to climate change hysteria) are very rare in the UK Parliament.
You could put a saint in Parliament and within a week he’d be fiddling expenses etc etc etc
are here any sane (non demented) people left in this world
Apparently just you and I Peta, lol.
Except when Peta has had a dozen glazed donuts.
Quote:-
“If they are burned then that CO2 is released back into the air so there is no overall loss or gain. This means wood-burning on its own can be described as “low carbon”.”
This omits all the very energy intensive processes of logging, making the wood pellets and transport across the ocean to the U.K..
Yet another example of the UK political classes endorsing a policy ‘because climate’ that cannot have any effect on the climate.
Its the most extraordinary aspect of the current climate mania. One can sort of understand that people might think that human CO2 emissions are a problem and want to reduce them. Its mistaken, but its not an obviously crazy idea.
But the measures they have embarked on, in the UK, on their own theory can have no effect on the supposed problem. This is just the latest in a series.
Its like someone panicking on a cruise ship, claiming that its about to sink, and demanding that tea cups be issued to all the passengers so they can help bail it out when the imaginary sinking happens.
Even were it sinking… teacups….???
Yes, “teacups” is a good analogy.
For scale, consider that the uptake of CO2 by plants on land by photosynthesis is upwards of 440 billion metric tons per year. The climate mitigation effectiveness of capturing and storing 15 million metric tons per year can never be reliably confirmed anyway, even if you (mistakenly) believe emissions of CO2 are harmful in respect to warming. It is one part in ~29,000.
It is all plainly a costly misdirected illusion.
Some of the comments here are incredibly naive. The whole point of net zero is to monetise an artificial scare of climate change which in fact is probably natural and the claimed cause of which can only make life better for humans – by improving agricultural productivity and causing less deaths from extreme temperatures.
The whole idea of net zero is to make fortunes for elites from guaranteed subsidies while impoverishing and disempowering the mass of people – by reversing Western economies.
All well known and declared by the UN IPCC, written into the 1992 Agenda 21. NOTHING to do with saving the planet from anything. In fact making it worse for humans to live in as above. Paying crooks to pump CO2 down a hole in the ground with no measure of where it goes or any real benefit accruing to those forced to pay for it. What could be a more blatant legalised fraud? Want to offset CO2 from Drax – just burn clean gas and plant half as many trees somewhere its cheap to do it.
Simple ………..but no subsidies for UK elites rolling in the subsidy trough they have created, as recommended to their clients by Gummer,Skidmore, etc.
That’s strange, the same argument is used against solar and wind power installations almost every day here on Whats Up With That.
But the evidence is overwhelming against wind & solar.
“
Beccs is an unprovenWind and solar arecontroversialwasteful technologyies that cannot be guaranteed to delivernegative emissionselectricity to the grid 24/7/365 and will cost bill-payersevenever more.”As to your remark doonman. Fixed it.
I don’t see what your problem is, doonman. The statement you quote is true. Very few commenters here will disagree with it.
An extra criticism of Beccs, not often pointed out, is this: Reducing extra CO2 (from burned trees) tomorrow, with extra trees planted today is always putting the cart before the horse. It means CO2 emissions must necessarily increase by a vast amount before any reductions can be gained.
That, of course, just doesn’t work for an action-today green-disaster scenario. At least, not to any thinking person.
“the cart before the horse”
That’s just a rear wheel drive cart.
Net Zero is unscientific. See this from MIT and from Princeton. No wonder govements are beginning to back off it.
https://co2coalition.org/wp-content/uploads/2023/02/2023-02-23-Challenging-Net-Zero-with-Science.pdf
Good link 👍
“Instead of continuing support for wood-burning in the UK we should be investing in wind and solar which bring down energy bills and make a genuine positive contribution to the UK’s climate change efforts.”
Another deluded idiot.
So it’ll become less energy efficient, burn even more trees.
I calculated a year or two ago that if Drax were supplied by a pine plantation on a 30 year rotation giving average yields, it would require an area almost the size of Wales to support its then current electricity output.
That would make an interesting essay.
I am reasonably confident that trees offer higher energy density than either wind or solar in the UK and overcome the storage issue.
I did some sums on UK wind and arrived at a larger area than the country to supply the current energy requirements for the country.
Agreed. It would make a nice short article here at WUWT.
Note to US readers: “an area the the size of Wales” is a unit commonly employed in BBC-speak and lame-stream media. Just as length might be defined as distance to the moon. Volume has often been defined in terms of Saint Paul’s Cathedrals.
I guess it’s a good thing to bring scientific units to the masses (pun intended) but it’s usually a sign the media author is not up to speed.
That’s not any implied criticism of MrGrimNasty, by the way.
Which is why they’re clear-cutting trees in North America, which has more forested land than the UK.
Your conclusion is only half right.
Yes, it will become less energy efficient.
No, assuming it currently operates at full load, it will not burn more trees, it’s already burning as many as it can.
The CCS will be a parasite feeding on the energy produced by Drax.
Much of the energy produced will be consumed by the CCS process which will be energy intensive. Thus, if Drax now produces 4% of UK electricity demand, once the CCS system is installed and operational, the energy it consumes will not be available for sale to the market.
How much energy will the CCS require?
They are not saying, which itself is an interesting data point.
Wikipedia says 10% to 40%.
So, I make a first-pass, order of magnitude,worst case (many decades in engineering project management has taught me that the “best case” is a very seductively dangerous myth, never, ever plan on it) assumption the CCS system will require 40% of Drax’s power output to operate. Drax would therefore supply only 2.4% of UK demand, the shortfall will need to be made up elsewhere.
The multi-billion investment in CCS at Drax will significantly reduce its output to the grid thus increasing the level of subsidy required, and the reduced power output to the grid will require the construction of additional generating capacity elsewhere.
CCS is one of the most monumentally stupid and wasteful concepts ever.
Some 15+ years ago, I read an article in that woke journal New Scientist, all about Drax and its carbon capture plan. At the time I thought ‘yeah they’ll scrap it, when they realise the cost’. And about a year later they did.
Now, they’re resurrecting it, only because we’ll be paying for it.
And for once, with respect to cutting down healthy trees, to fiddle a carbon footprint, I’m with the greens. But still object to nut-zero.
I worked on the carbon capture pipeline project 8 years ago until the time the government pulled the funding. I worked out the costs for sequestering a minute (small fractions of 1%) quantity of the world’s CO2 and realised what a waste of money it was then. The mind boggles that it’s been revived.
Personally speaking I’d install the latest flue technologies etc and revert it back to coal.
That, to me, makes perfect sense.
Question: There’s this strange white crystalline stuff falling from the sky. Anyone know what it might be???
Silver?
If only!
And the coal mine, was just down the railway track at Selby.
The greener the alternative the more impractical it becomes.
That is a phrase that should be repeated everywhere, so true.
The more inefficient the energy production, the more we must subsidise it. Green 180 economics.At it most ridiculous in waste treatment. Ended badly with double ROC plasma treatment at Rotherham. Amongst many problems, the idots making the laws and management greedy for the easy, guaranteed subsidy profits, simply didn’t understand that waste with most of the wood and paper already removed from it was not calorific enough to burn easilly, but they could not see the science for the sound and smell of easy subsidy money. It is not ending well, except for the subsidy collectors who got onto ROCs before the criteria became less of a blatant get rich quick racket for government cronies.
Anyone in the UK, should not let their kids see that stuff. UK kids are not supposed to know what it is.
“Question: There’s this strange white crystalline stuff falling from the sky. Anyone know what it might be???”
Global warming powder, of course!
No no! Its Unicorn Farts!
Apparently you’re one of those children that Dr. Viner warned us about, strat?
“There’s this strange white crystalline stuff falling from the sky. Anyone know what it might be???”
It can’t be snow. In 2000 we were told that, in future, people would see snow only in films. The guy who told us that was a Met Office scientist, so it must be true – right?
In the UK it’s very cold and apparently next week will be even colder, with lots of that white stuff that can’t be snow. Where’s global warming when you need it?
Chris
They should fit carbon dioxide transmutation technology.
Proof Of Reactions Inside The Thunderstorm Generator | Vortex Fusion
Wow, oxygen is transmuted into neon because of bubble power brought about by Yin Yang forces.
It’s no wonder that those like, Andrea Rossi, can keep scams going on for years and decades without delivering any working product.
@Scissor: Who is Andrea Rossi?
Please look a bit further.
Proof of Plasmoid Transmutation in the Thunderstorm Generator | MAJOR NEW FINDINGS
Oops
Rossi is another scam promoter but they all behave similarly.
They make claims that their device can produce near limitless energy. The promoters set up demonstrations that purport to “prove” their claims. They never actually produce a working product, however.
In the case of “Plasmoid Transmutation,” a claim is made that an engine outfitted with the device can boost the fuel efficiency of by 100% or more. Fine, put the device on a lawnmower and show that it’ll run twice as long as normal.
Instead, they use indirect measurements for “proof” measurements that can be fooled.
ULTR – A simple quick and repeatable demonstration of the LENR process – ISCMNS 15 – Assisi – 2022
https://youtu.be/AZ9RJr_s31w
Vortex tubes are real, plasmoids are real, put them together and it’s easy to baffle people with bullshit.
@Scissor
You need to look at the SEM materials analysis
THOR – It’s Ball Lightning! Or is it? SEM/EDS recorded session – inside of outside near yellow waves
https://youtu.be/CbwGT-jplxI?t=5326
I did. I am very familiar with SEM having used it in catalysis research in a previous position. Basically, I see a lack of controls and very poor signals in these experiments.
There is nothing that is 100% pure from an analytical perspective, so impurities will show up via SEM. Greenyer should have specified the source and purity of the indium foil he used.
Not just Indium foil.
That was just an example.
Based on the failure of cold fusion in general, it’s probably nothing but a scam, but skeptics can be proven wrong, though they seldom are. I see too many commonalities with other scammers, like Rossi.
Nikitin, A.I., Bychkov, V.L., Nikitina, T.F., Velichko, A.M. and Abakumov, V.I., 2018, March. Sources and components of ball lightning theory. In Journal of Physics: Conference Series (Vol. 996, No. 1, p. 012011). IOP Publishing.
It’s good to see that some view the cited paper with skepticism. Now appearing on the online version of the article: “05 January 2024 Editor’s Note: Readers are alerted that the conclusions presented in this article are subject to criticisms that are being considered by the Editors. A further editorial response will follow the resolution of these issues.”
I would smile but it’s so painful. Drax was built on top of one of the largest coal (old wood) fields in Britain reducing transportation costs. Similarly Fiddler’s Ferry. Fiddler’s Fery is in the process of being blown up and the South Lancashire (St Helens) coalfields all shut.
Drax now imports millions of tons of kiln dried wood pellets (new wood). Why is this not called out as the environmental disaster that it is?
“Why is this…”
Because it fails the narrative compliance test.
Here’s a rotary dryer that is used to dry sawdust for pelleting.
I’ll admit, it took me a few seconds watching to get the joke. I had to watch the rate at which the product appeared.
🙂
It’s a religion, and as a religion it’s right in there with sacrificing virgins and other made up superstitions. Here’s one from my file of taglines, quotes factoids and smart remarks:
_______________________________________________________
“It could not be simpler,” said the Aztec priests. “We simply cut out beating
hearts and roll heads down the temple steps … and it rains.” They all believed it.
_______________________________________________________
From message board a long time ago, somebody with Kront as a moniker used it as a tagline.
It’s a religion…
“We are the Priests
Of the Temples of Syrinx
Our great [climate model] computers
Fill the hallowed halls
We are the Priests
Of the Temples of Syrinx
All the gifts of life
Are held within our walls” (Rush)
“They say Drax’s clear-cutting of forests in North America destroys the environment rather than supporting it.”
Not true.
destroys the environment
No, it just changes it. It also creates opportunities.
I’m sorry, but I simply don’t have the time to go through all of the references to peer-reviewed scientific papers, not to mention all of those links, that you provided to support your conclusion.
Proponents will claim that wood waste and forestry slash is used, and that is true to some extent. However, there is an abundance of pulping wood that became available from the demise of physical newspapers. A lot of that is used also.
Joseph, it takes 80 years to grow back the square mile you cut down in year one, plus to keep your steam turbines running you’ve cut down 80 more square miles by then. So you seem to be counting on picking old dead trees out of 80 square miles for 80 years in your environmentally friendly forestry fuel project. How much is that going to cost per ton of fuel ?
You’ve claimed environmentally sensitive tree harvesting many times. Like man, show us your assumptions and calculations please.
Where is your evidence of 80 years? There are reforested areas around here, Vancouver Island, that are on their second or third cut. Mt brothers land was clear cut to build on and when he moved onto the land the trees were no more than 6 to 10 feet tall, now, as I look out the window, there is merch timber growing.
I’ve explained it many times in long comments. I’m not going to waste time doing it again. All I’m going to say is you don’t have a clue. I have 50 years experience as a forester. You’re just believing what climate nut job forestry haters are pitching. It’s a lie.
I expect China is UK’s largest single source and it continues to increase as UK dependence on Chinese manufacturing ramps up. I am betting the bulk of the carbon capture equipment will be manufactured in China using Chinese, Mongolian, Indonesian and Australia coal. Some component packing may be Chinese wood that can be chipped for burning at Drax.
Greens are so ignorant and gullible. They have not idea how stuff gets made.
Most greens think that snow comes out of the atmosphere. Few realise snow is just solid water that came out of the oceans. Climate modellers assume that the atmosphere manufactures water from nothing so I expect most greens align with this fallacy.
Pollster : Where does electricity come from ?
Greenie : Wall sockets ! ! !
Pollster : Erm … OK, noted … Where does food come from ?
Greenie : The supermarket (/ Waitrose / Fortnum & Mason) ! ! !
Pollster, sotto voce : Oh boy, this is going to be a loooooooong day …
Some of the media used to be nearly on the ball when it came to, say, exporting waste disposal issues. They’ve never had the same appetite for looking at waste generation at the front end of the consumption cycle.
“They say that despite changing from coal to wood Drax remains the UK’s largest single source of CO2 emissions at more than 13 million tonnes a year.”
But if they’re using wood, it’s “carbon” neutral, right?
A waste of money and energy.
Wrong….not a waste but instead more steps at which tax can be collected and the money reinvested to create even more tax collecting steps. All administrative types know that the more tax collection steps you have, the more people they can employ in their department and make their jobs seem even more important to society.
Since recorded history, if you could build impressive enough stone monuments, attract people on pilgrimage with tales of healing and spiritual uplifting, tax the locals putting up kiosks selling artifacts, request donations from the pilgrims to support the narrative being espoused by donation-seeking monks daily at the monument steps…..well, it’s generally been a recipe for success. Check modern economic theory. There is no longer a “broken window fallacy” as long as the activity creates a job and its spin-off taxation.
The net zero gravy train rolls inexorably on!
Where are the protest camps outside the North American pellet plants and where are the legislative hearing protests against state and federal tax incentives for these “green” jobs in the clear cut forests of North America? It is going on you know, and they even have public pensions funds investing in the deforestation.
The willfully blind leading the blind.
This is simply nonsense science – as is the entire lemming-like rush to Net Zero.
Just read this contribution from three authors, two of whom are senior academics from MIT and Princeton.
https://co2coalition.org/wp-content/uploads/2023/02/Challenging-Net-Zero-with-Science-digital-CO2-Coalition.pdf
Seems to me that any pumping of CO2 into the ground has the potential of a man-made Lake Nyos, Cameroon disaster effect. [On 21 August 1986, a limnic eruption at Lake Nyos in northwestern Cameroon killed 1,746 people and 3,500 livestock.] So much pent-up CO2 was almost instantly released from the lake, that being heavier than air and lacking the time to mix with the air, the massive CO2 release sought low lying areas where it apparently suffocated 1,746 people and many animals. Why pump plant food into the ground anyway. Don’t we need to feed the poor as well as the rich? Is this a communist plot?
Courtesy of Wikipedia we get to see the essentials of the person in charge of this fiasco:
Claire Coryl Julia Coutinho (born 8 July 1985) is a British Indian politician and former investment banker who has served as Secretary of State for Energy Security and Net Zero since August 2023. A member of the Conservative Party, she has been the Member of Parliament (MP) for East Surrey since the 2019 general election. Prior to her current role, she served as Parliamentary Under-Secretary of State for Children, Families and Wellbeing from October 2022 to August 2023 and as Parliamentary Under Secretary of State for Disabled People from September to October 2022.
Born in London, she attended James Allen’s Girls’ School, and studied mathematics and philosophy at Exeter College, Oxford. After graduating she worked for investment bank Merrill Lynch, conservative think tank Centre for Social Justice, industry group Housing and Finance Institute, accounting firm KPMG and as a special adviser in HM Treasury.
Being Under Secretary of State for Disabled People is particularly applicable experience for an immense power plant project.
If I’m interpreting the article image of the Drax Power Station correctly, we need to understand that the large curved towers are cooling towers that only release Water Vapor – at 95%, the Big Dog GHG,of atmospheric GHG effects (while methane, CO2, particulates, other trace gases, etc. make up only the remaining 5% of GHG effects). The one tall, slender tower is where the burned coal exhaust is vented. Notice that there is no apparent, visible, exhaust? That’s because most particulates have been scrubbed out and pretty much the rest is CO2 plant food for greening Earth. You don’t see an exhaust because CO2 is colorless, odorless, else people would be able to see and smell their own exhalations as we respire to live. That is: scrub out mercury, sulfur dioxide,particulates, and other trace nastiness, and what is the Drax Power Plant and other Modern Coal Power Plants relegated to? Ans: Wonderful Electricity and Food Generators to benefit all mankind – I understand the starving and the poor really like food. Hello coal power plants, and Yea CO2.