KUCHING: Sarawak Premier Tan Sri Abang Johari Abang Openg said his visit to a power generating station at Selby near the city of York, England, yesterday, was to learn how the station had transitioned its generation from coal to renewable energy.
In a stop-over in the United Kingdom before flying off to Poland, where Abang Johari is scheduled to speak on Sarawak's experience in its energy transition initiative, renewable energy security, decarbonisation and environmental sustainability tomorrow, he said he wanted to gain insight on how Britain's biggest renewable power generation station had switched from coal to biomass.
In a report posted on the Sarawak Public Communications Unit (UKAS) Facebook page, Abang Johari said, "there are many new things that we can learn here".
The Drax power station generates 3.9 gigawatts of electricity, primarily from wood waste imported from Canada and the United States.
He said the technology employed by Drax could be used for Sarawak's renewable energy generation operation.
He added that the technology could probably be adapted to "develop a new, more efficient power plant" tailored to the state's resources.
Owned and operated by Drax Power, a unit of Drax Group, the plant generates about 18TWh of electricity a year, which accounts for six per cent of the UK's total electricity supply.
The four biomass-fired units of the plant provide 2.6GW, which constitutes about 12 per cent of the UK's total renewable power supply, while the two remaining coal-fired units, capable of generating a total of 1.3GW, are planned to be replaced with two 1.8GW gas-fired combined-cycle units by 2025.
Drax is the second largest producer of sustainable biomass in the world.
Abang Johari's was invited to attend the central European hydrogen technology and the central European decarbonisation forums by the Marshall of Wielkopolska region, Marek Wozniak.