- Britain's first major electricity plant to be fuelled
by grass will begin construction later this year.
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- The £6.5m power station in Staffordshire will be
burn locally cultivated elephant grass and will be able to supply 2,000
homes with electricity.
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- Amanda Gray, director of Eccleshall Biomass, the company
behind the power station, said the project was of major importance to rural
industry in Staffordshire and offered another way to meet the UK's obligation
to reduce carbon emissions, because burning the elephant grass will only
release the carbon dioxide that the plants soaked up anyway while they
were growing.
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- The plant could be a key element in the quest to tackle
climate change. With only 1% of the world's population, the UK produces
3% of the world's greenhouse gas emissions.
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- Power stations are a major factor, pumping out around
a third of the total carbon dioxide produced by the UK. The government
wants to reduce the country's carbon emissions by 60% by 2050 and wants
renewable energy, such as wind, waves and biomass, to play a key part.
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- Around 170 farmers are now diversifying into growing
the energy crop to feed the two megawatt steam-turbine generator at the
Raleigh Hall industrial estate, in Eccleshall, near Stafford.
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- The local regional development agency, Advantage West
Midlands (AWM), has also got in on the act by approving a £935,000
grant to help pay for the power station.
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- A spokesman for AWM said agricultural activities accounted
for nearly 75% of land use in the region and the plant would play a vital
role in regenerating the rural areas and enabling farmers to diversify.
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- The plant would operate for 8,000 hours a year on a 24-hour
basis and save one tonne per hour of carbon dioxide, which would otherwise
have been emitted using fossil fuels to generate electricity.
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- Guardian Unlimited © Guardian Newspapers Limited
2005
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- http://www.guardian.co.uk/climatechange/story/0,12374,1495401,00.html
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