Fires at two of three approved BESS facilities in San Diego County
Jim Desmond’s concerns surrounding battery storage technology stem from recent high-profile fires at two of three BESS facilities green-lit for construction by San Diego County officials.
As reported in Energy-Storage.News, a battery unit at Terra-Gen’s 140MW/560MWh Valley Center BESS caught fire on 18 September 2023, causing a quarter-mile evacuation area that lasted until later in the evening, when the fire had been contained.
This incident was then followed by a much more significant fire at Rev Renewable’s Gateway Energy Storage facility that first ignited on 15 May 2024. An evacuation order was deployed by the California Department of Forestry and Fire Protection (CalFire) for San Diego that lasted until 28 May, while it worked to contain the fire.
In daily statements posted on X (formerly Twitter), CalFire reported several instances of thermal runaway at the Gateway site, deploying up to 40 fire personnel during the height of activity. The causes of both fires are currently unknown amidst ongoing investigations.
The third BESS facility approved by San Diego County officials is San Diego Gas & Electric’s (SDG&E’s) Fallbrook energy storage facility that was brought online in 2022. Ownership of the 40MW BESS was transferred from AES Corporation to the California public investor-owned utility (IOU) upon completion of the project under a build-own-transfer agreement.
Dozen active BESS applications in San Diego County
During the meeting, Desmond stated that there were currently 12 active BESS applications with San Diego’s Planning and Development Services department at various stages of the approval process, including another development from AES known as the Seguro energy storage project.
It was recently reported by local news outlet Coast News that the Palomar Health Administration had denied an easement which would have allowed the 320MW/1,280MWh BESS to connect to SDG&E’s Escondido substation via land owned by the Palomar Medical Center.
According to an AES website, the project was initially envisioned as having 400MW/1,600MWh of storage capacity but had been “reduced due to stakeholder and community feedback”.
San Diego BESS standards could incentivise use of industrial zones
During the meeting, Desmond explained that the development standards should stop developers locating BESS facilities in residential areas but also incentivise developers to locate facilities within industrial zones.
He also requested that at the next meeting, the board instate a temporary 45-day moratorium (with up to two 1-year extensions) on the approval of any new BESS facilities until the new standards had been adopted.
The development of BESS standards is expected to cost San Diego County up to US$1.25 million.
‘Really big problem’
The Vice Chair of the San Diego County Board of Supervisors Terra Lawson-Remer expressed concerns surrounding a potential two-year moratorium on the installation of new BESS facilities.
Lawson-Remer, also on the Board of Directors for California Community Choice Aggregator (CCA) energy supplier San Diego Community Power (SDCP), said that although she wanted to “move expeditiously” to create the new standards, it was her understanding that it could take up to two years or more for them to be developed, and that the county would have a “really big problem with local energy needs” if no new sites could be built during this period.
Instead of instating a blanket moratorium, the board passed a motion agreeing to adopt new standards but also decided that at the next meeting it would discuss several potential stopgap measures to incentivise BESS safety whilst the standards were being developed.
The board agreed that the discussion points should include a temporary moratorium on new BESS applications, mandatory board review of all new BESS projects and interim standards within six months.
Watch the 17 July 2024 Board of Supervisors meeting below, discussion of Item #8 on establishing development standards for siting of BESS begins at 1 hour 20 minutes.
12-month moratorium for New York town
Elsewhere in the US, the Town of Wilson in Niagara County, New York recently enacted a 12-month moratorium on the processing of any new permits for projects with BESS facilities, whilst town officials drafted new local laws for battery siting.
At the Wednesday 17 July 2024 meeting, town supervisor Tony Evans said that the town would “take their time” drafting the new laws and would extend the moratorium if required.
Like California, there have been several high-profile fires at BESS facilities within the state of New York, including incidents at three separate facilities which occurred last year during May and July.
This led to the formation of the New York State Inter-Agency Fire Safety Working Group, which released its first set of recommended changes to the New York fire code during the first quarter of this year, as reported by Energy-Storage.News.