Aussie power takes root in the Dales

THE landscape of parts of North Yorkshire could be transformed into Australian-style forests with gum and willow trees.

While it may be too cold for koalas, Yorkshire farmers are keen to plant 26,000 acres of these tough trees.

The reason? They are being encouraged to go green to help fight global warming, and the fast-growing trees are destined for the furnaces of Europe's largest coal-fired power station, Drax, near the defunct Selby coalfield.

Power station bosses have had talks with local farmers to provide Drax with hundreds of thousands of tons of pulp from eucalyptus and willow trees.

Gerald Wingrove, chief executive of Drax Power, which provides nearly 10% of Britain's electricity, wants his plant to become greener as part of the Government's campaign to cut carbon dioxide emissions by 10%.

As a first step, Drax has signed a deal with Renewable Energy, a private company, to provide it with 14,000 tonnes of pulped willow. This will be delivered by barge down the River Ouse from a 2,000-acre willow forest near Eggborough, North Yorkshire.

Wingrove said: 'We are in talks with farmers and want to agree contracts on planting eucalyptus and willow trees. Eucalyptus trees are particularly efficient as a fuel and grow very fast.The farmers are very keen on the idea.'

The pulp is mixed with coal to make it cleaner. Drax buys nine million tons of coal a year, half of it from abroad, and the plan now is to buy 500,000 tonnes of trees by 2009.

Crops grown specially for use as environmentally friendly fuels are known as biomass.

Though biomass is three times more expensive than coal, Drax will earn a certificate for each unit of energy produced by green fuels. Under a government scheme, more-polluting providers will be forced to buy these certificates, so Drax will be able to cover its costs.

Centrica, Britain's biggest gas supplier, is tipped as a possible investor in Drax as it tries to hedge against wild swings in wholesale gas prices and goes back to its roots in coal generation.