Region blazes UK trail in developing green energy

Projects worth a total of £1.9 billion, leading to the expected creation of more than 5,400 jobs, were confirmed in the region.

Further investment worth £1.8bn, bringing another 5,600 jobs, are also in the pipeline in the sector in Yorkshire, the Department of Energy and Climate Change said.

Total investment in renewables across the UK was worth £7bn in 2011-12, supporting 20,800 jobs. Another 18,000 jobs could be created if new projects worth nearly £11bn are taken forward.

Only Scotland came close to Yorkshire in attracting new business, with investment worth £1.7bn creating 4,700 positions.

Investment in the region includes a plan by the giant Drax power station to invest £50 million in a new biomass plant at its existing co-fired plant near Selby.

Huddersfield-based David Brown Gear Systems is investing £2.8m to set up a wind turbine research centre in Mirfield creating 80 jobs. The firm has also won a multi-million pound deal with technology giant Samsung to build gearboxes for its 7MW wind turbine.

Final approval is awaited from Ministers for the flagship £210m Green Port Hull development between Associated British Ports and Europe’s largest engineering firm Siemens, which it is hoped will put Hull at the heart of the renewable energy industry in a major project to develop offshore windfarms.

Energy giant E.ON is going ahead with its £736m Humber Gateway offshore windfarm in the Humber estuary.

There are also hopes new technology in carbon capture storage could be harnessed in the region to store harmful emissions of carbon, enabling the supply of low-carbon electricity.

Sam Pick, of the Renewables Network, which represents 200 renewable energy companies on both banks of the Humber, said the region was a major focus for investment in the field.

“From the nationally-recognised Siemens development to E.ON’s Humber gateway development and the work at Drax and carbon capture and storage in South Yorkshire, the region really has developed as the UK’s centre for the renewable energy sector,” he said.

Renewable energy now generates around 10 per cent of UK electricity.

Other projects in the region include the development of a plans to supply heat and electricity from woodchips at the Port of Immingham in investment worth £130m.

Yorkshire Water has also awarded a £25m contract to a West Midlands-based firm for the design and construction of a new energy scheme to save millions of pounds in electricity consumption and expenditure at the Esholt treatment works near Bradford by turning waste into a bio-gas which will be burned to produce electricity.