British developer gets green light for 200 MW battery

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British energy storage developer Kona Energy has secured planning permission for a 200 MW battery which will reduce curtailment of electricity from six offshore wind farms.

The planned battery, at Heysham on Morecambe Bay in Lancashire, will also replace local grid services due to be lost when the Heysham 1 and 2 nuclear reactors are decommissioned, in 2024 and 2028.

A press release issued by London-based Kona this week did not reveal the energy storage capacity of the planned facility.

Kona said the battery will be installed at the landing site for wind farms including the large Walney development, and “will be one of the largest in Europe.”

Quoted in the press release, Kona founder Andy Willis said the battery would be in an area which suffers regular curtailment of wind power and “other low carbon technologies”: the B7a constraint boundary.

“Roughly GBP 1 billion ($1.25 billion) was spent in the last year curtailing energy from wind farms and other generators, replacing that need elsewhere – usually from fossil-fuel [-powered] stations,” said Willis. “Tackling this enormous waste of both money and energy is crucial.”

Kona said the site would also provide inertia and reactive power support grid services, the need for which will be more acute after the nearby nuclear reactors are shuttered.

The London-based company's website states Kona is developing a 500 MW pipeline of UK energy storage projects.

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