Coal gives way to waste and biomass at Ferrybridge

Ageing Yorkshire power plant will close next year after smaller mulifuel plant is commissioned

Operators of the last generation of large coal-fired power stations are bowing to inevitable environmental and modernisation pressures by closing some of Britain’s well-known energy landmarks. But they are also switching their attention towards cleaner alternatives.

SSE announced in May that it is to close the giant, 48-year old, Ferrybridge coal-fired power station located on the River Aire in West Yorkshire at the end of March next year, following a review of its coal-fired assets. Yet the company remains committed to the Ferrybridge site and is currently commissioning a new, smaller ‘multifuel’ project rated at 68 MW generating capacity there.

The current Ferrybridge C plant – the third coal-fired power station to be built on the site since 1924 – first fed electricity into the national grid in February 1966. It has two chimneys reaching 198 m into the sky, and eight 115 m high cooling towers, the largest of their kind in Europe.

Units One and Two at Ferrybridge power station were opted out of the Large Combustion Plant Directive (LCPD) and turned off once they used up their allowed 20,000 operating hours at the end of March 2014. Units Three and Four (together 1010 MW) were retrofitted with flue gas desulphurisation technology to enable them to comply with the LCPD.

However, costs at the power station have been rising and it is forecast to lose £100mn over the next five years, says SSE. This financial situation, combined with the political consensus that coal has a limited role in the future, means keeping the station open is not sustainable.

Meanwhile, the £300mn Ferrybridge Multifuel 1 project – currently being commissioned at the site as part of a £400mn joint venture between SSE and Wheelabrator Technologies – is due to be commercially operational towards the end of this year. The plant will operate using a range of fuel sources, including waste-derived fuels from various sources of municipal solid waste, commercial and industrial waste and waste wood.  The plant will take fuels from across Yorkshire and the wider region.

It will provide 46 full-time jobs at the site, says SSE. The Ferrybridge Multifuel 2 project currently being developed at the site could create similar benefits if it is granted planning consent, adds the company.

SSE has a particularly wide range of power generation assets, from gas, coal, oil-fired and a couple of biomass-fuelled thermal power stations; some 65 hydroelectric installations located mainly in the Highlands of Scotland; and both onshore and offshore wind farms.