400MW biomass cap uncertain
7 Apr 2014
Government is struggling to reach its 400MW biomass cap as the scrapping of several schemes leaves just 73.5MW approved.
UK government plans to limit the number of new build biomass plants have forced several major developments to fold, with it now looking likely that it may struggle to reach an imposed 400MW cap.
Renewable energy firm RES in March announced it was abandoning its 100MW Port of Blyth biomass power plant in Northumberland due to uncertainty over subsidy support for the scheme.
The gradual erosion of support for dedicated biomass left the company with no option but to abandon the project
RES CEO Gordon MacDougall
This announcement came less than eight months after the project was approved by environment secretary Ed Davey.
This approval was despite government policy that stated new dedicated biomass plants would not be welcome in the new contract for difference subsidy for renewables, unless they had a combined heat and power (CHP) element.
And any new plants unable to meet the CHP requirement would have to fight over support under the existing renewable obligation (RO) scheme, which the government had capped at 400MW.
RES blamed “ongoing uncertainty” in UK energy policy for the withdrawal of a key, and as yet unnamed, development partner late last year, which has rendered the Blyth Port project no longer viable to develop.
RES chief operating officer for the UK Gordon MacDougall said “the gradual erosion of support for dedicated biomass” left the company with “no other option” but to abandon the project.
Port of Blyth was one of the 1GW-worth of dedicated biomass projects under development in England that had been forced to compete for RO support within the 400MW cap, and RES’ executives are not the only ones to pull the plug on projects.
Last October E.ON scrapped its 150MW Portbury Dock project in Bristol, declaring that “under the current regulatory framework” the project “was not a priority investment for E.ON”.
Meanwhile RWE’s 65MW Stallingborough project in Lincolnshire has been put on hold.
In fact, so far only two projects totalling 73.5MW have been approved by the Department of Energy and Climate Change to receive RO support within the 400MW cap: Eco2’s 42.5 MW North Lincs project and EON’s 31MW Blackburn Meadows.
