The Henderson Board of Zoning Adjustment Wednesday evening denied a conditional use permit for a battery energy storage system which the Henderson Municipal Power & Light had planned to locate on a South Green Street parcel.
The vote, taken at nearly four hours into a sometimes contentious meeting, was 3-1 to not grant the appeal that HMP&L had made to locate a BESS at 2230 S. Green St. on a property that abuts the utility’s Substation #7. The city of Henderson zoning ordinance requires that a BESS be located in a heavy industrial zone and a conditional use permit be granted by BOZA for these systems to be constructed.
The reasoning boiled down to safety concerns of the BESS system, which would be located within a stone’s throw of residences as well as Matthew 25 Aids Services, all of which are on Old Corydon Road.
Eight community members spoke against the facility, each worried that massive fires and the effects that rise from them that have occurred at other BESS facilities in this country and in other places in the world could occur here.
Although HMP&L General Manager Brad Bickett and a representative of NextEra Energy repeatedly told the audience that BESS with new technology is safe, one BOZA member, Heather Knight, said the lack of documentation or studies presented by those companies kept her from voting for approval.
“I felt like I didn’t have enough information,” Knight said. She said that other groups or individuals who have come before BOZA have produced documentation to support their requests.
Bickett said representative test data had been shared with local officials, but that couldn’t be made public because it is proprietary and NextEra doesn’t want its competitors to know their technology.
BOZA members Marcos Nicolas and Mac Arnold also voted to deny HMP&L’s appeal.
Having documentation or studies available to the public proved to be one of the major points of contention between the two sides. Throughout the meeting, Bickett and Josh Adams, the fire safety subject matter expert for NextEra, refuted claims from community members about the safety of BESS.
Both said that the publicized fires at other BESS—what Adams termed “cascading thermal runaway events”—occurred years ago when both battery technology and fire suppression technology of BESS were not advanced as it is today.
Additionally, Bickett assured community members that a BESS at the location would not be built unless the Henderson Fire Department thoroughly examined the detailed site plan and checked off on each of 18 points of an “Outdoor Energy Storage System Submittal Checklist” provided by a consultant, Summit Fire Consulting of Wakefield, Rhode Island, that the city of Henderson has hired to help them prepare for coming BESS.
Also, community members wanted to see plume analysis—which would detail the chemicals released in the air and how far they spread. Both Bickett and Adams said that analysis couldn’t be performed at the South Green Street site until the engineering of the plan reached 60% complete. At Wednesday night’s meeting, NextEra said it was at almost 30%.
What further handcuffed HMP&L was that engineering cannot proceed unless its appeal for a conditional use permit were granted. Only after approval of the conditional use permit could further engineering occur, and only at or beyond the 60% engineering level can a plume analysis be done for the specific site.
So, the information residents wanted couldn’t be gathered unless a conditional use permit were granted—what BOZA chair Rob Toerne termed a “catch 22.”
Additionally, BOZA members asked HFD Chief Josh Dixon if he believes the BESS would be safe. He said he can’t form an opinion because he hasn’t received specific studies or information from NextEra to make that determination.
Bickett assured the audience that although HFD didn’t have that information now, the fire department would be the final arbiter in determining if the system is built.
“This project will not be built without the fire department’s approval,” Bickett said.
The BESS planned at the South Green Street location would include 16 containers that are 20 feet long, 8 feet wide and 9 ½ feet tall, surrounded by a 7-foot-tall chain link fence with razor wire on top. It was to be 100 feet from the nearest property line. Additionally, Bickett said there would be another 30 feet from the fence line to the containers inside the fence.
One of the points Bickett mentioned at the meeting was that with the new technology of current BESS, people can stand at the fence and be safe.
Still, without documentation or studies to support HMP&L’s stance, residents—and ultimately a majority of BOZA—were not convinced.
Eric Stinson, who said his daughter and granddaughter live near the site, wrote a letter submitted into the record that said the risks of BESS to residential communities, Henderson Community College and the nearby industrial workforce make it inadvisable to locate at the South Green Street location. He also spoke at the meeting, citing specific past thermal runaway events that have occurred at other BESS.
“I don’t think the risk is worth the reward,” Stinson said.
Resident Abigail Wheaton, who lives a half mile from the site, said there are just too many unknowns about the BESS’ safety. She also questioned what it would do to property values and homeowner insurance rates. At a second time at the podium, she said that of the residents who’d spoken, “not one resident here has said that this is a good idea.”
After the meeting, Leslie Cannon, who has lived on Old Corydon Road for 54 years, expressed glee that the conditional permit was not granted. Cannon, also fearful of fire and the possibility of chemicals blowing, said the project space is virtually in his backyard.
“I’m real happy,” Cannon said.
The lone vote for approval came from BOZA member Landon Overfield, who also made the motion to grant the conditional use permit. He listed seven conditions to be met, among them that the BESS is always monitored and that all conditions of the Summit Fire Consulting list and approval by the Henderson Fire Department must be met before the system can be built.
Overfield said that he trusted that both HMP&L and the fire department wouldn’t allow anything unsafe to be built, and that the Henderson-Henderson County Joint Planning Commission wouldn’t approve an unsafe site plan, which would have been a later step in the permitting process to locate a BESS facility at the location.
Bickett said HMP&L will meet with NextEra to determine next steps. He said there are no plans at this point.
