‘Strong’ profits and emissions drop for Yorkshire power station

A Yorkshire power station has reported ‘strong’ results for H1 2019 as well as a reduction in carbon emissions.

Drax Power Station in North Yorkshire reported £34m in operating profits for the first half of this year, compared with £12m in H1 2018.

52 per cent reduction in its carbon emissions in the first half of 2019 compared to the same period last year.

The news comes as the government continues to promote its plan to achieve zero carbon emissions by 2050.

Will Gardiner, Drax Group CEO said: “Drax Group has delivered strong profit and dividend growth in the first half of the year. Integration of our new Hydro and Gas generation assets is progressing well and the value the Group delivers from supporting the energy system has almost doubled.

“Drax is playing an important role in the energy transition - our carbon emissions in the first half of the year have halved compared to last year. Having converted another generating unit at Drax Power Station to use biomass instead of coal last year, we’re now producing more renewable power at the times it is needed most – but we’d like to go further.

“If we can scale up our successful bioenergy with carbon capture and storage, Drax could become the world’s first negative emissions power station in the mid-2020s, helping to achieve the government’s net zero by 2050 carbon target.”