LONDON — For years, energy giant Drax has promised British ministers it can help keep the lights on — while limiting the harm. Those pledges are now in serious doubt.
The biomass company, which generates energy by burning wood pellets imported to its Yorkshire plant, has been backed by successive British governments since 2014.
It had pledged that, in the near future, vast carbon capture facilities will catch and bury its harmful emissions before they enter the atmosphere.
Subsidies for Drax represent some of the most high-profile British government support for green energy. And the addition of carbon capture — using a largely untested technology, known as bioenergy with carbon capture and storage (BECCS) — was considered essential for the country to hit legally binding goals on driving down U.K. emissions to net zero by 2050.
