PRESS RELEASE: Power station petition signed by over 110,000 to be handed to DECC by giant White Elephant
Jun 17, 2015 | Press Releases
When: 8:30-9:30, Thursday 18th June 2015
Where: DECC offices, 3 Whitehall Place, London SW1A 2AW
Who: Biofuelwatch, London Mining Network & Care2 Petitions https://londonminingnetwork.org/2015/06/pr-biofuelwatch-white-elephant/
“The UK Government is expected to make an imminent announcement of a grant of up to £1 billion to a coal power station ‘carbon capture’ project by a consortium including Drax Plc, owners of the UK’s largest power station [1]. In response to this, campaign groups Biofuelwatch, London Mining Network and US-based Dogwood Alliance, started a Care2 petition [2] against public support for the new power station, which was signed by over 113,000 people. Campaigners plan to deliver it to the Department of Energy and Climate Change with the aid of Rosie, a giant inflatable White Elephant.”
The amount of carbon dioxide in the air was roughly 403ppm. As of 2025 it is 430ppm, but check here for daily measures.
The broader context was that carbon capture and storage was close to getting some money…
What I think we can learn from this is that not every technofix arrives on time…
What happened next The second competition for CCS funding fell over and was followed by a long process of the shards of the Ming Vase being put together again, and then waiting for a long time…
What do you think? Does this pass the ‘so what?’ threshold? Have I got facts wrong? Interpretation wrong? Please do comment on this post, unless you are a denialist, obvs.
On June 13 June 2008 climate activists involved in the whole “camp for climate action” thing stopped a train heading to Drax power station in Yorkshire (the site of the first Camp for Climate Action, in August-September 2006).
They shovelled coal off it before the police arrived and arrested them all.
“Twenty nine people were convicted in July following a four-day jury trial at Leeds crown court. Today, at the same court, Judge James Spencer QC, ordered five, who had previous convictions, to do 60 hours unpaid work and three were ordered to pay £1,000 in costs and £500 compensation to Network Rail. The judge said the loss to the company had been almost £37,000. Twenty one members of the group were given conditional discharges for 12 months.”
And in January 2014… those convictions were quashed because the driver for the activists had been… undercover cop Mark Kennedy.
