GIANT tropical elephant grasses are to be planted across large swathes of British countryside under plans to encourage farmers to switch to crops that produce energy rather than food.

The plan would see at least 800,000 acres covered with plantations of the grass, which grows to a height of 12ft and has razor-sharp leaves.

Under the scheme, farmers will be offered government subsidies to grow the crop, while power generators would receive further subsidies. Burning the grass instead of fossil fuels will reduce Britain’s carbon dioxide emissions.

However, critics claim that the awesome size and alien appearance of the plants will spoil the landscape.

John Clifton-Brown of the Institute of Grassland and Environmental Research in Aberystwyth is leading a government research project to promote the plants.

Next week he will deliver a paper at the British Association Festival of Science in Dublin describing the ambitious project.

“The process is carbon neutral,” he said. “Overall it gives us energy with no net greenhouse gas emissions.”

A new generation of power stations that will burn the grass is being built. One at Eccleshall, Staffordshire, is close to completion.

Its output will be equivalent to the power needs of 2,000 homes, and hundreds of farmers in the surrounding area will be asked to switch land from arable crops to elephant grass.

A similar scheme is under way around the Drax coal-fired station near Selby, Yorkshire, Britain’s largest power station, which supplies 7% of the nation’s needs. A deal has been signed to grow elephant grass on farmland around Drax and use it as a partial substitute for coal. Overall the scheme should cut Drax’s greenhouse gas emissions by about 5%.

Clifton-Brown will tell the British Association there is much more potential. He has been appointed by Defra, the environment and farming ministry, to oversee a project aimed at producing elephant grasses that are bushier and faster growing than those currently cultivated.

David Croxton of Curdon Mill Farm, Williton, Somerset, receives £80 per acre in single-farm subsidy payments and about £260 per acre more from sales of his 500-acre crop.

“It’s also really good for wildlife with deer, pheasants and other animals using it for cover,” he said.

Tom Oliver, head of policy at the Campaign for the Preservation of Rural England, said elephant grass would alter the landscape wherever it was planted.

“Energy crops are a good idea,” he said, “but we need to assess the visual impact in each area where they are proposed before letting them be planted.”

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