In July 2025 we handed in our first Open Letter to government, urging ministers to reject plans for data centres submitted by Drax. Following the new ministerial appointments in July 2026, we’ve expanded the letter with 30 further signatories, and sent it to the new AI Minister: Kanishka Narayan.
Dear Secretary of State Jonathan Reynolds & Minister Kanishka Narayan,
Open Letter: 106 organisations say no to the UK government funding Drax to power data centres
We are writing to express our deep concern at the recent application by North Yorkshire Combined Authority, in partnership with North Yorkshire Council, Drax Power Station, the University of York and other organisations to become an “Artificial Intelligence Growth Zone” and would urge that this application be rejected. We had previously written to the former Secretary of State Liz Kendall about this.
In February 2025, Minister for Energy Michael Shanks announced the government’s plan to award Drax four years of further subsidies via a new Contract for Difference, from 2027 (when Drax’s existing subsidies end) until 2031, despite widespread criticism of Drax and the subsidies they receive from MPs and Peers across the political spectrum as well environmental NGOs and other civil society organisations in the UK and abroad. During that announcement, Michael Shanks stated that this subsidy decision “will ensure Drax plays a much more limited role in the system, providing low carbon dispatchable power only when it is really needed” and that “Drax will be supported to operate at a maximum load factor of just 27% – operating less than half as often as it currently does.”
If Drax was to become part of an Artificial Intelligence Growth Zone award, then the Energy Minister’s assurances to Parliament would effectively be overturned and Drax would continue to operate at far greater than a 27% load factor, i.e. burn significantly more wood than foreseen by DESNZ.
The criteria for who can apply to be an AI Growth Zone state that sites located near land suitable for the development of low-carbon power generation and energy storage infrastructure will be viewed favourably.
We therefore must make it clear that Drax power station does not provide low-carbon electricity generation. Drax biomass power station is the UK’s biggest single carbon emitter and world’s biggest tree burner. Last year alone it emitted over 13 million tonnes of carbon into the atmosphere. – 3.5% of UK total emissions. Drax burned 7.3 million tonnes of wood, much of it from the clear-felling of biodiverse forests in the Southern USA, Canada and Europe, with catastrophic impacts on forests, wildlife, communities and the climate. Burning wood for electricity releases significant CO2 that isn’t offset for decades until trees eventually regrow, if ever. Hundreds of scientists warned: ‘this burning of wood will increase warming for decades to centuries… even when the wood replaces coal, oil or natural gas.’ The Climate Change Committee has found that the “sustained use of large-scale biomass generation is not compatible with the path to Net Zero”. The European Academies Science Advisory Council, and Chatham House, have both reached the same conclusion.
Please also note that, in 2018, the then government decided that no new CfDs should be given to biomass plants unless their life-cycle greenhouse gas emissions are below 29 kg CO2e / MWh, a figure far below Drax’s lifecycle emissions. These figures are based on a methodology that does not account for smokestack emissions from biomass combustion, nor for most other emissions other than those from fossil fuel combustion along the supply chain. Nonetheless, even under that methodology Drax’s supply chain emissions are such that they would not be considered ‘low-carbon’ going forward. The decision announced in February 2025 exempts Drax from the 2018 rules on the grounds of energy security, not because Drax’s supply-chain emissions are now considered differently.
The bid in question is claiming that Drax Power Station, near Selby, would be home to a new AI and Clean Energy campus on the basis that the site would be able to develop bio-energy with carbon capture and storage (BECCS) to deliver carbon negative power, helping the UK to meet climate targets.
However, being “able” to develop BECCS simply means having sufficient space on the site for building a capture plant. Other than a very small-scale solvent testing experiment (with a maximum of 27 tonnes of CO2 captured and then emitted into the atmosphere), Drax has not carried out any Research and Development into carbon capture, has no active plans to do so, and, furthermore, there is so far no planning consent for a CO2 pipeline to transport any CO2 that might be captured by Drax in future either. There are no known examples of functioning or scalable BECCS projects involving woody biomass combustion anywhere in the world. Neither Drax nor anyone else has the technical know-how to capture carbon from woody biomass burning at scale and mass redundancies have recently been made by Drax backed company C-Capture. Scientists from across the globe have raised the alarm on BECCS.
We also wish to make you aware of the serious impacts of logging on biodiverse forests in the USA, Canada and the Baltic States, from where Drax sources most of the wood pellets it burns. Investigations have shown that there are material impacts on biodiversity as a result of bioenergy harvests in forests including in Estonia, the United States, and Canada where old, even ancient, forests are being logged for wood pellets.
In addition, pellet production supplying Drax Power station causes significant harm to communities, particularly environmental justice communities, i.e. communities with a disproportionate number of people living in deprivation and with a large percentage of non-white people, especially in the US Southeast. Pollution from the mills exacerbates health problems in communities with high levels of poverty (and that are majority-Black) and Drax has been accused of driving environmental racism. The use of land for biomass also wastes space which could be better used for nature recovery and sustainable food production.
We therefore urge you to ensure that Drax will not be incentivised to burn even more wood than they will be under the recently announced 2027-2031 subsidies. We look forward to hearing from you.
Organisations
UK-based organisations:
Axe Drax
Biofuelwatch
Campaign against Climate Change
Chesterfield Climate Alliance
Christian Climate Action
Climate Action North East Derbyshire
Coal Action Network
Corporate Watch
Derbyshire Climate Coalition
Earth Thrive
East Midlands Combined County Authority Climate Coalition (EMCCA Climate Coalition)
EcoNexus
Environmental Investigation Agency
Extinction Rebellion Calderdale
Extinction Rebellion Glasgow
Extinction Rebellion Leeds
Extinction Rebellion York
Fossil Free Greater Manchester
Fossil Free West Yorkshire
Friends of the Earth (England, Wales and Northern Ireland)
Friends of the Earth Selby
Fuel Poverty Action
Grassroots Wirksworth
Green Christian
Greenpeace UK
Greener Jobs Alliance
Global Action Plan
Global Justice York
Health for Extinction Rebellion
Just Transition Wakefield
The Lifescape Project
London Mining Network
MP Watch
Norwich Friends of the Earth
Operation Noah
People & Planet Sheffield
Scrap Carbon Capture
Stop Burning Trees Coalition
South Yorkshire Climate Alliance
Tipping Point UK
Troublemakers
Weald Action Group
Yorkshire and Humber Climate Justice Coalition
Zero Hour
Organisations based in countries that export wood pellets to Drax
350 Seattle, USA
Acréscimo – Associação de Promoção ao Investimento Florestal
Biomass Action Network
Biomass Working Group, PNW Forest Climate Alliance, USA
BirdLife Estonia
Coastal Plain Conservation Group, USA
Conservation North, Canada
Dogwood Alliance, USA
Estonian Forest Aid
Estonian Fund for Nature
Holding Nature, Estonia
IRIS – Associação Nacional de Ambiente, Portugal
Latvian Ornithological Society, Latvia
Mighty Earth, USA
NRDC (Natural Resources Defense Council), USA
Partnership for Policy Integrity, USA
Puse Latvijas, Latvia
Quercus – ANCN, Portugal
The Rachel Carson Council, USA
Save Estonia’s Forests, Estonia
Southern Environmental Law Center, USA
Stand.earth
ZERO – Associação Sistema Terrestre Sustentável, Portugal
International network:
350 Deschutes
A Community Voice
A2 (Anthropocene Alliance)
Alliance for Community Engagement (ACE) SW WA
Athens County’s Future Action Network
Bulkley Valley Stewardship Coalition
Cherokee Concerned Citizens
Clean Air Action Network of Glens Falls
Climate Communications Coalition
Climate Emergency Science Law
Cyber x Climate
EarthNeighborhood Productions
Ecology Center
Friends of the Earth US
FÓRUM CARAJÁS
GAIA (Global Alliance for Incinerator Alternatives)
Global Forest Coalition
Global Justice Ecology Project
Heartwood
Hull and East Riding Friends of the Earth
John Muir Project
Mount Shasta Bioregional Ecology Center
Mums for Lungs
NC Climate Solutions Coalition
NC Disaster Response and Resilience Network
Old-Growth Forest Network
Olympic Climate Action
Pivot Point
Protect Our Streams
RESTORE: The North Woods
Science Alliance for Forestry Transformation
SOS Save Our Sumter
Southern Forests Conservation Coalition
Standing Trees
Tennessee Heartwood
The Working Class Climate Alliance
Three Rivers Waterkeeper
Valley Improvement Projects
Young, Gifted & Green
Zero Waste Ithaca
