Queen goes green to power Windsor Castle

LONDON - Queen Elizabeth has drawn praise from environmental campaigners with an announcement that Windsor Castle is to be partially run by hydro-electric power.

A spokeswoman for the Royal family said they were delighted with the plans to build a four-turbine, energy-efficient plant in the River Thames that would provide around a third of the required energy to run the castle.

"We're constantly looking at ways of saving energy," she said. "The Royal household has an ongoing policy of introducing and maintaining energy-efficient practices wherever possible, and sees consent of the Romney Weir Hydro Scheme as a major contribution towards this practice."

Tony Jupiter, director of environmental group Friends of the Earth, praised the Royal family for the initiative.

"We're delighted that the Queen is taking a lead in the use of green electricity to help tackle global warming," he said. "It highlights the massive potential for small scale micro-generation systems within the UK."

The energy-efficient plan is one of many adopted by the Royal family over recent years.

The Duke of Edinburgh's taxi is run on liquid petroleum gas and a bore hole at Buckingham Palace is used for air conditioning in the Queen's Gallery and to maintain water levels in the Palace lake.

In 2000, heir-to-the-throne Prince Charles was named as the "most inspirational figure worldwide" by a panel of environmental magazines for his work in promoting green issues.

The new hydro plant, which will be the biggest of its kind in the south of England, will be built at Romney Weir near Windsor on the River Thames and will supply electricity directly to the palace, not into the local grid.

Construction is expected to begin in early 2006 by Npower renewables and should be completed by the end of the year. It will cost up to one million pounds.

"It will offset approximately 600 tonnes of carbon dioxide every year which would otherwise have been released in to the atmosphere from the burning of conventional fossil fuels," project manager Alastair Gill said.

- REUTERS