We dont take whole trees. You do. And how billions of pounds of our cash is funding this. Logging naturalforests and converting them into pellets to be burned for electricity, that is absolutely insane. Theres no other word for it. This is britains biggest Single Source of electricity. The Drax Power Station in yorkshire used to burn coal, but its switched to burning wood pellets as part of the uks drive to cut Carbon Emissions. And that means the company has received around £6 billion in green subsidies. Theres just one problem. Burning wood pellets actually gives out more Greenhouse Gases than coal. Now, Carbon Dioxide is invisible to the human eye, so you cant actually see all of the carbon coming out of that chimney, but wood burning releases plenty of it, even more than coal. So were actually paying for this Power Station to kick out more Greenhouse Gases than before. And drax is in line to get billions more from the taxpayer. Actually coming out of those chimneys right now is mo
we don t take whole trees. you do. and how billions of pounds of our cash is funding this. logging naturalforests and converting them into pellets to be burned for electricity, that is absolutely insane. there s no other word for it. this is britain s biggest single source of electricity. the drax power station in yorkshire used to burn coal, but it s switched to burning wood pellets as part of the uk s drive to cut carbon emissions. and that means the company has received around £6 billion in green subsidies. there s just one problem. burning wood pellets actually gives out more greenhouse gases than coal. now, carbon dioxide is invisible to the human eye, so you can t actually see all of the carbon coming out of that chimney, but wood burning releases plenty of it, even more than coal. so we re actually paying for this power station to kick out more greenhouse gases than before. and drax is in line to get billions more from the taxpayer. actually coming out of those chimne
but where do all these logs come from? so, we re sitting outside one of drax s pallet plants in a place called meadowbank. it sjust gone 10am and i ve seen a big lorry with three lengths of logs, so it s a truck and a trailer, turn in to meadowbank. so it s clearly dropping off some rather big logs to the pallet plant. drax gets most of its logs from other companies. we re going to follow this truck to see if they re coming from a primary forest. so, this is our truck that we re following. he s gone north out of drax s pallet mill. and all we can do now is see where he goes. we follow the truck for 60 miles before it turns off a main road.
and straight onto the weigh scales. and you can see, welcome to drax meadowbank. you very publicly say that you avoid damage or disturbance to high carbon forests. there is no way you can make that statement. that s a lie. but we re not taking whole trees. we take the sawdust. no, no, you are. ..from the sawmills. i saw the truck with whole trees going from primary forest that had just been destroyed to your pellet plant. so let s talk about the business model for drax. no, no, can wejust engage with what i ve seen? you re saying you don t destroy primary forests but how are you not destroying primary forests when you take trees from primary forest that s been destroyed? so we take sawdust from the sawmills. our business model is not built around taking whole trees from forests as you described. in a written statement, drax gave a different explanation. it accepts logs were taken from this forest, but says they were tree species the timber industry didn t
ground up to make pellets. drax is now the world s second biggest producer of wood pellets. this is its meadowbank plant near the logging city of prince george. once again, piles of logs are stored all around the site. wow. the scale of this plant! you can see the pellet plant itself pouring out that steam and that smoke. and then all those between us and that is just layer upon layer, row upon row of all these tree trunks. it s staggering. drax says it only uses waste wood, but that s not what some of these logs look like.