Question to the Department for Business, Energy and Industrial Strategy:

To ask the Secretary of State for Business, Energy and Industrial Strategy, with reference to the Answer of 21 December 2021 to Question 93001, what methodology his Department uses to assess the impact on climate change of burning trees at the Drax power station if it does not collect data on replantation of trees.

Biomass operators are only subsidised for feedstocks from forests that are managed sustainably and whose carbon stock is constant or increasing. In order to mitigate the risk of underestimating carbon emissions, forest carbon stock changes are set to zero in the Government’s assessment of the climate change impact of unabated biomass combustion, even though forest carbon stock can increase when sustainable forestry practices are utilised.