Drax has power to innovate without a fanfare

But in day-to-day business life in Yorkshire, innovation can take many forms and be much lower profile, according to Peter Emery, the production director at Drax power station in Yorkshire.

“There are lots of way you can innovate, many of which are not exactly visible to many in the outside world but can make a massive difference to a company and its success,” he said.

Drax is sponsoring the category for Innovation of the Year at next month’s Yorkshire Post Excellence in Business Awards.

Mr Emery said: “Our view is that for a business to differentiate itself, innovation is critical.”

While people might think of Apple products and Dyson vacuum cleaners, there is lots of innovation in marketing, system-based enhancements and HR and productivity improvement, he said.

Mr Emery added: “Drax is no stranger to innovation in a number of ways that are not clear to anybody outside the station.”

He said the £700m move from coal to biomass has required enormous change, involving the modification of existing boilers, safety systems, material handling and storage infrastructure. “It’s a whole new industry,” said Mr Emery, who is also a non-executive director at NG Bailey.

Drax is converting three of six units at the station to burn biomass instead of coal. The company converted the first unit in April after two years of technical trials.

Once the three units are converted by the second half of 2014, Drax will be burning 7-8m tonnes of biomass a year and is expected to be contributing around 10 per cent of Government clean energy targets for 2020.

Drax imports the biomass from North America, southern Europe and the Baltics, mostly in the form of wood pellets made from low-value forest products.

Mr Emery said Drax is working with US companies in the pulp, paper and construction industries to try to complement what they do and add value to the forestry owners “so they want to do business with us and we get cost-effective biomass fuel”.

Drax is building two manufacturing plants in Louisiana and Mississippi to turn forest residue into pellets. It is also developing a new port facility in Baton Rouge to ship biomass to the UK.

Mr Emery said ports in East Yorkshire are developing innovative new infrastructure to handle biomasss.

Drax unveiled the UK’s first purpose-built biomass freight wagon at the National Railway Museum in York this summer.

Developed by designers at Lloyd’s Register Rail and manufactured by WH Davis, it is the largest ever produced and pushes the boundaries of rail engineering.

Drax has also modified its straw pellet plant at Goole to handle miscanthus, commonly known as elephant grass, of which it sources 40,000 tonnes a year from Yorkshire farmers.

Mr Emery said: “All parts of the supply chain are requiring a lot of innovation. We think it’s important that it’s recognised and encouraged.

“In our experience it’s tough to do it well. It does take courage and commitment and does not happen easily.

“Businesses do deserve recognition who have innovated successfully.

“It took us a long time to move from a coal-only power station with not much of a future with hundreds of protesters outside to one that has the potential to be the largest renewable facility in the world.”

He said the winner of the Yorkshire Post Excellence in Business Award for Innovation of the Year will be a company which can demonstrate that it has transformed its business model or has given itself a competitive edge by instituting radical change.

DLA Piper, Goldman Sachs, PwC and Yorkshire Bank are main sponsors for the awards programme.

Bradford University School of Management, O2, QBE Insurance and thebigword group are associate sponsors, alongside Drax.

Entries for the awards have closed and judging is now under way with the shortlist to be announced imminently.

• Tickets are available from the Editor’s Secretary via [email protected]