Energy firm ‘unworthy’ of green levies paid boss £1.9m last year

THE biggest recipient of Britain’s green energy levies paid its boss £1.9 million last year, it emerges, amid calls for the subsidies to be removed from soaring bills.

Drax, whose green credentials have been called into question after it emerged its biomass power plant was releasing more carbon into the atmosphere than coal, receives more than £800 million a year in climate levies, almost twice that of any other renewable generator.

At the same time, Will Gardiner, the electricity producer’s CEO, received the equivalent of a £800,000 pay rise to take home £1.9million on top of almost a million he made on his shares in the company, now worth £3.5million.

It comes as MPs have been calling on ministers to consider removing green subsidies that make up almost a quarter of household bills to help keep down soaring energy prices.

Many of the smaller firms that receive the levies are based offshore and therefore do not pay tax, Andrew Bridgen, the MP for Northwest Leicestershire, has warned the business secretary.

Removing the social and environment levies, which fund energy efficiency improvements as well as renewable projects, would reduce annual bills by £170 “overnight”, energy giant Centrica has claimed.

Drax receives £832 million per year in green subsidies, which is nearly twice as much as the next most generously subsidised generator, Walney Wind Farm, which receives about £490million a year.

A Drax spokesman said that it received the most subsidies as it is the biggest producer of renewable electricity, producing 12 per cent of the UK’s supply. The biomass burnt at its plant in North Yorkshire, wood pellets made from the equivalent of around 25 million trees, is counted as carbon neutral under international rules largely because the trees are replanted.

Lord Randall, the Tory peer, who was environment adviser to Theresa May, said: “Regardless of what is going on with energy bills, I do not believe that Drax is actually an appropriate recipient of subsidies.

“I am in favour of green subsidies, but only if they go to genuinely renewable green energy, and I do not believe that Drax falls into that category.”

The Government has so far refused calls to remove the green levies from bills but a spokesman said they “recognise people are facing pressures with the cost of living” and are “taking action worth more than £4.2 billion” to support “vulnerable households”.

A Drax spokesman said they play a “vital role in maintaining secure energy supplies, keeping the lights on for around four million households – whatever the weather” while providing jobs.

‘Regardless of what is going on with energy bills, Drax is not actually an appropriate recipient of green subsidies’