Drax Data Centres Briefing

Key Points

• Drax is the UK’s largest carbon emitter, releasing 14 million tonnes of CO2 in 2025 by burning 7.5 million tonnes of wood.
• A Drax-powered data centre would lock in high emissions for decades.
• Research suggests Drax’s data centre proposal would burn 2.5 million tonnes of wood up until 2030, and 5 million tonnes from 2030 onwards.
• No proven technology exists to capture CO2 from burning wood at scale.
• Even if BECCS (Bioenergy with Carbon Capture and Storage) worked, it would not deliver carbon-negative energy or help meet 2050 Net Zero targets.

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Drax’s Data Centre Proposals

In February 2025 the Government announced new subsidies for Drax from 2027-2031. The Heads of Terms announced allow the plant to operate at a maximum 27% load factor. If Drax is included in an AI Growth Zone, this would override the Energy Minister’s assurances to Parliament, and result in far more wood being burnt than intended by DESNZ. 

AI Growth Zone criteria favour sites near low-carbon energy infrastructure - but Drax is not low-carbon. It is the UK’s largest carbon emitter and the world’s biggest wood-burning power station. In 2025, it burned 7.5 million tonnes of wood - much of it from clear-cut, biodiverse forests in the U.S., Canada, and Europe - causing serious harm to ecosystems, communities, and the climate. The CO₂ released isn’t reabsorbed for decades, if at all.

Drax recently began proposals to build an initial 100MW data centre at their site, with the option to expand to a 1GW data centre directly powered by Drax in 2031. North Yorkshire Council recently ruled that Drax doesn’t need to provide an environmental impact assessment (EIA) despite the well-documented impacts of data centres on water and energy. If approved, this would be disastrous for forests, communities and the climate.

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Climate and Forest Impacts
Burning wood at power stations like Drax releases large amounts of CO2 that isn’t offset for decades - if at all. The Climate Change Committee (CCC) warns that continued large-scale unabated biomass use is incompatible with Net Zero and should end once subsidies expire in 2027.

Counting biomass as low carbon is misleading. Drax is the UK’s largest carbon emitter, releasing 14 million tonnes of CO₂ in 2025. Scientists warn that burning wood - even instead of fossil fuels - increases warming for decades to centuries. The European Academies Scientific Advisory Council concluded biomass burning causes long-term climate harm.

Drax’s wood is mainly sourced from forests in the southeastern U.S. and Canada, including biodiverse and old-growth areas. This degrades habitats for threatened species like the caribou, black bears, flying squirrels and numerous bird species, causing serious harm to nature and wildlife as shown by multiple NGO and BBC investigations.

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Issues with BECCS

Proponents of BECCS argue that biomass can replace fossil fuels as a carbon-neutral energy source. However, BECCS is only carbon-negative if the bioenergy itself is low-carbon; this proposition is based on the net transfer of CO2 from the atmosphere into the growing biomass that takes place during photosynthesis.

This balance breaks down when biomass is burned rapidly and at scale, making it a net CO₂ emitter comparable to fossil fuels. There are currently no scalable, nor functioning BECCS projects using woody biomass. Research shows that biomass from forestry residues cannot meet the urgent emission reduction timelines required, as it can take 44–104 years to reabsorb the released carbon. Even if BECCS were viable, it would not enable the UK to reach net zero by 2050.

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Community Impacts
In the U.S. Southeast, where most of Drax’s wood pellets are sourced, communities suffer from air pollution caused by pellet mills, which emit harmful PM2.5, nitrogen oxides, and volatile organic compounds linked to cancer, respiratory and pulmonary health issues. These mills are 50% more likely to be located in low-income, non-white “environmental justice” areas. Drax has faced multiple fines and, in 2022, was accused of environmental racism after settling air pollution violations in Louisiana.

Burning wood at UK power stations like Drax also releases PM2.5, which scientists say has no safe level for human health - putting nearby communities in Yorkshire at serious risk. Moreover, Drax is facing lawsuits from workers after developing industrial asthma linked to wood dust on the site. Any Drax data centre would exacerbate the already extremely harmful impacts upon communities abroad and in Yorkshire. 

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Expensive Subsidies and Alternative Investment
Drax has announced planned job cuts of at least 350 (10% of their global workforce), with about 150 of those being from Drax’s Yorkshire site (over 30% of the site's workforce). These cuts were announced as 2025 already saw a reduction of 269 staff from 2024 levels. 

Data centres are typically highly automated, requiring relatively few long-term staff (primarily in IT, facilities, and security). Claims that Drax building and powering data centres would create job security are at odds with the company’s own current redundancy process. Moreover, analysis by Food and Water Watch of Virginia data centres found just 1 permanent job is created for every $13 million invested.

Yorkshire deserves real green jobs. Research shows that there are over 73,000 direct green jobs needed to decarbonise Yorkshire over the next 10 years. Communities don’t need to remain tied to polluting industries - future employment lies in renewables, grid upgrades, energy storage, retrofitting, regenerative farming, and recycling. 

We urge you to oppose any Drax data centre. Proceeding with any of these projects would directly contribute to increased forest degradation, ongoing pollution in impacted communities, and a long-term rise in carbon emissions. 

For more information please contact stopburningtreescoalition@gmail.com.