Battery energy storage system planned for agricultural land near a new electricity substation in Biggleswade
A pre-application inquiry and environmental impact assessment screening have been submitted to Central Bedfordshire Council by Yorkshire-based Harmony Energy.
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Hide AdThe firm aims to submit a planning application this autumn for a 200 megawatt scheme off Dunton Lane.
Development director at Harmony Energy Frances Nicholson told town councillors: “The company is mainly a battery energy storage developer, owner and operator.
“We’ve energised 17 sites overall and are in this for the long haul,” she explained. “Projects have a lifespan of 40 years, but that doesn’t mean we won’t be applying for planning permission to repower the site.
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Hide Ad“It’s a location connecting to the new electricity transmission substation, which is being built and is close to being energised. Our grid offer takes advantage of that capacity.
“It exports and imports electricity as and when peak demands require it or the network needs an immediate response, such as blackouts. This would be enough to power 300,000 homes continuously for two hours from just under ten acres.
“We appreciate some agricultural land out is taken out of production, but unfortunately that’s where new development needs to go in this day and age.
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Hide Ad“We’re a small island nation. We need to use green fields at some point to continue dealing with increasing population size, energy demand and other new technologies we require to stabilise and decarbonise our grid.
“We know which mines the lithium iron comes from and we know where it’s refined. The mines are mainly in Chile and Brazil. The minerals are refined in Australia and China.
“Those battery cells as per plenty of the technology we use in our daily lives is manufactured in China, so the battery cells are made there after the refinement of the lithium iron. These cells are transported to the USA where they have a large Megapack factory in Fremont.
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Hide Ad“The batteries are then shipped over here,” she added. “Unfortunately we can’t control the supply chain and how many air miles are included within this whole process.
“That’s just symptomatic of the way the global economy works now and we seem to have plenty of our manufacturing based in far away lands. The carbon pay back of these sites in the production and the manufacturing of the batteries is around three to four years.
“There might be other technology to emerge which is more efficient, and quicker and cheaper to deploy. There’s talk around smaller nuclear reactors, but we’re a long way off that.”
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Hide AdAbout 140 of these sites are operating in the UK, according to Ms Nicholson. “The land itself can be returned to agricultural use at the end of its lifespan quite easily,” she said. “We’re not putting in giant depths of foundations and using concrete.
“We try to locate these batteries as close as possible to the point of connection because the grid costs are the biggest constraint to the viability of delivering one of these sites.”
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