Letters: Drax saves carbon and US forests flourish

These letters appear in the 8th January 2015 edition of The Independent

The electricity generated by Drax accounts for about 7 or 8 per cent of the total power of the National Grid (AFP/Getty)

The claims made by the European Environment Bureau (letter, 7 January) are inaccurate on a number of counts.

Drax has used the latest technology to transform itself from one of Europe’s largest single sources of CO2 to Europe’s single largest decarbonisation project. This has been achieved by upgrading half our coal units to generate electricity using sustainable biomass, and with the right support we want to convert the remainder of the power station.

Independently verified data shows the process Drax has developed produces an 86 per cent carbon saving against using coal. This factors-in carbon costs from across the supply chain – including harvesting, processing and transportation.

The biomass industry is not the driver for felling trees. US forestry production in working forests is driven by construction and furniture making which uses high value wood. Drax uses forestry by-products which are much lower grade and much lower cost.

Drax only sources from sustainably managed working forests which are growing, not declining, including the south-east US. In fact forest growth has outpaced removals for more than five decades in the US and now covers more than 766 million acres – around one third of the entire US landmass and greater than it was 100 years ago.

We insist on the highest sustainability standards for our biomass, and our suppliers must produce detailed information, scrutinised by independent auditors, which is then captured in legal contracts. The independent regulator Ofgem also rightly demands the biomass we use meets their tough criteria.

Dorothy Thompson

Chief Executive, Drax

London EC2

I am writing to response to your 5 January story, “The power plant that’s chipping away at the UK’s carbon footprint.”

As a lifetime resident of the southern US, I believe the only thing that Drax is chipping away at is the forests and long-term economic health of our region. In fact, rather than calling this the UK’s largest decarbonisation project it should be called the UK’s largest deforestation project.

The rapidly expanding wood-pellet industry is having a negative impact on forests, communities, biodiversity and our climate. A growing demand for wood for energy is leading to increased logging that impacts water quality, wildlife, and the quality of life in our communities.At the amount in which Drax consumes wood, there is no such thing as “good biomass”. The controversy will only grow.

Rather than bailing out a dying industry, the UK should invest in truly clean and renewable energy like wind and solar, and as the article concludes. Let’s hope this boondoggle fizzles out over the coming years.

Adam Macon

Dogwood Alliance

Asheville, North Carolina, USA

Democracy flounders without leaders

Our two main political parties are led by weak leaders who cannot impose their views on their MPs.

Cameron is forced to let his ministers campaign for leaving the EU when he is in favour of staying, and Corbyn is not strong enough to remove Hilary Benn as foreign secretary or to stop his MPs fighting each other instead of holding the Government to account. I do not think this is good for our democracy.

Valerie Crews,

Beckenham, Kent

In the run-up to the Corbyn reshuffle we were promised a fireworks display by the media. Unfortunately, the Labour Party refused to make good on that promise by exploding for our delectation. Now the media is accusing Labour of letting the nation down with a damp squib.

This only the latest let-down of many since Corbyn was nominated for the leadership. He doesn’t seem to get the hang of the narrative at all.

Given Corbyn’s incompetence when it comes to following the path laid down for him, may it now be time for the media to be led by the news the Labour Party actually generates rather than presenting us with all this breathless anticipation?

Pete Marchetto

Guilin, Guangxi, China

This Government is floundering, with advice ignored on flood defences, 20,000 refugees due shortly, without preparation for their reception, and a record trade deficit. Yet the Labour Party is mesmerised by the Shadow Cabinet posts, while the Liberal Democrats are not on the radar.

Gladstone and Lloyd George, must he turning in their graves.

William Haines

Shrewsbury

Cologne puts asylum conventions in doubt

Events in Cologne, Frankfurt and Hamburg at the New Year in which over 100 women were sexually assaulted, and more robbed raise uncomfortable questions for all European nations.

The assaults involved between 500 and 1,000 men in Cologne and were apparently carried out by men of North African or Arab origin. A British victim is reported as saying that the attackers spoke neither German nor English. The conclusion is that these men were recent migrants from the Middle East.

Asylum rights rest on the basis that people from other cultures are safe to release into the cultures that accept them. These events in Germany call those assumptions in to question.

Another feature of the recent migrant wave from the Middle East is that it is predominantly male. Given the widespread misogyny and gender-based violence in the cultures from which the migrants stem, European nations who accept such people are incubating major problems for the future.

European nations, including our own, must put the security of our own citizens first and must subordinate our approach to asylum to that end. The Cologne experience makes it clear that fundamental changes will need to be made to refugee and human rights conventions.

Otto Inglis

Edinburgh

Floods divide the country

As a southerner, I grew up in Wimbledon. Attending a northern university, Newcastle, I can see at first hand the ever-widening North-South divide.

As a puddle in Newcastle becomes a national talking point, less is being said by ministers about cuts to flood prevention schemes which have resulted in catastrophic damages to homes and livelihoods in the “northern powerhouses”. A year ago the Government found £297m for flood defences in the Thames Valley, but cancelled plans for a £180m scheme in Leeds.

Where does this invisible North-South border exist on Ordnance Survey maps? A Womble may never experience the fog on the Tyne, but natural disaster and personal devastation should transcend imaginary boundaries.

Juliet Fletcher

Newcastle Upon Tyne

Spare a thought for Sir Philip Dilley (“Floods chief: I might have been in Barbados but I wasn’t away”, 7 January). His selfless stewardship of the Environment Agency in the face of intolerable hardships – a taxpayer-funded salary of £100,000 for three days’ work a week, a Caribbean holiday at the same time much of the North of England sinks – must surely, according to government thinking, mark out Sir Philip as a public servant of the highest order.

Once the waters have retreated and we’ve all moved on, will it be too much to expect a (Tory) peerage for the poor fellow?

Richard Butterworth

Redruth, Cornwall

Why lottery punters carry on losing

Your reporter and your correspondents (letters, 6, 7 January) do not seem to grasp one of the main factors in motivating lottery ticket buyers. Yes, the odds make nonsense of the “investment” from a money point of view, but they do make sense when viewed as buying a dream.

Sitting on the bus on the way to work in a morning and gazing out of the window is far more enjoyable when one can dream of how one would spend the millions, if won. The expenditure of a few pounds admits the ticket holder to a week of fantasy.

This is why ticket sales are higher among the poorer in society, the richer can achieve their dreams, the poorer can at least buy a remote contact with them.

David Battye

Sheffield

A future away from Rochdale

I can answer Simon Kelner’s question about Rochdale – what did Rochdalians do to deserve Simon Danczuk’s saga? (Voices, 6 January.) We abandoned it.

Those of us who were raised and educated in the town in the 1970s, if we could, went to university and never went back. We took our council grants and plied our knowledge and skills elsewhere.

The mills closed and unemployment rose. Little investment and no vision led to expectations of decline which, for my part, I did nothing to rectify. Thank you, Rochdale, for my start in life, but it was a choice – your future or mine. I was not the only one.

Brandon Ashworth

Sheffield