Balancing potential and trade-offs: Reflections on biomass, net zero and partnership

Patricia Thornley was invited to attend the Science Summit in January 2026, hosted by the sustainability team at Drax  in Yorkshire. The event was an opportunity for academics, PhD students and industrialists to discuss the science underpinning net zero and UK energy systems.

Patricia shares her thoughts and reflections from taking part in the panel session exploring considerations into deploying biomass sustainably and a fireside chat with Jack Cunningham, Sustainability Director for Drax.

By Patricia Thornley

Within the panel session we explored the pros and cons of the versatility of biomass as a renewable energy resource. As a dispatchable renewable containing carbon, biomass can be put to many uses. This should be an asset, but often seems to end up as a disadvantage, as it isn’t “the default” for any particular sector. In the Supergen Bioenergy Hub, we have chosen to focus on those sectors where we think greatest carbon benefits are possible and research can add value: aviation; materials; hydrogen; negative emissions.

We discussed the fact that all low-carbon energy has an impact, and trade-offs between those impacts are both inevitable and subject to external influences and perhaps even subjectivity.

During the fireside chat, I explored with Jack Cunningham, the importance of the Supergen Bioenergy Hub not just doing research but also focusing on having a positive enabling environment across industry, policy, public and professional sectors.

We delved into what is needed to sustain enduring industry-academia partnerships: a deep understanding of each other’s activities and concerns; co-alignment of objectives and an effective interplay – more than knowledge transfer – but pre-empting problems and working semi-continuously on supporting and learning from each other to be there in a timely fashion when needed.

There are benefits for both sides (academia and industry) from true partnerships, as each can reach areas that the other cannot. So it is really important to build trust and expand knowledge of “the other side” to get the most out of that.

However, it is a tricky tightrope to walk, especially when compounded with pressures for researchers to obtain industrial funding/leverage – can academics retain that important independent credibility and public trust if work is being funded directly by industrialists? This is particularly important in a contested area like bioenergy.