Energy company E.ON yesterday used five quotes, from surveyed homeowners living in Kingsnorth, to back a claim that local people support plans to replace the company’s ageing power station with another that will be more efficient but still heavily polluting. It is not certain that E.ON’s new coal-fired development will go ahead – Business Secretary John Hutton will rule later this year – but Mr Hutton is one of several government ministers backing the development. Mr Hutton is a vocal supporter of both coal and nuclear power and wants another seven coal-powered plants to be built in the UK in addition to Kingsnorth II.
Coal is the dirtiest fuel there is and the RSPB, many other groups, scientists and other experts believe new coal-fired power stations should only be allowed if the means to store their carbon emissions are built at the same time.
E.ON’s survey said that 57 per cent of people living near Kingsnorth backed its plans for the new, cleaner power station. Far fewer than you might think in fact, and significantly less than the 67 per cent who told E.ON’s surveyers, MORI, that cutting emissions was vital. Some people added comments to their responses. One said the new Kingsnorth had ‘got to be cleaner’, another that energy for new homes ‘must come from somewhere’ and a third, that ‘a diversity of fuels’ was needed. The RSPB backs these statements together with another respondent’s view that Kingsnorth should only go ahead if the means to store its emissions are built simultaneously. There is no guarantee that this will happen at the time of construction or any time in the future. The government is running a competition for funds to develop carbon storage facilities but if E.ON doesn’t win, the company has already said it will not pay for the technology itself. That means that Kingsnorth II will be twice as polluting as an equivalent gas-powered station and will not store any of those emissions. Of course some of the people of Kingsnorth and the surrounding area want a cleaner power station – we all do - but significantly more of them want emissions cut to tackle climate change. These two aims are not compatible unless all new power stations, starting with Kingsnorth, can store their emissions and store them from the start.
Read E.ON's press release here
Read more on the RSPB and climate change here