The Henderson County Fiscal Court on Tuesday approved sending a revised zoning ordinance for battery energy storage systems to the Henderson-Henderson County Joint Planning Commission for review at its July meeting.
The revision came about after Judge-Executive Brad Schneider withdrew from consideration a previous zoning ordinance proposal for battery energy storage systems at the joint planning commission’s June 4 meeting.
Planning commissioners at the meeting had concerns about the safety of the large utility battery storage systems. Those concerns were heightened after a presentation from Zion Fire Department’s Chris Watson.
Watson’s presentation concerned thermal runaway events that have occurred at battery energy storage systems across the nation. In these, the lithium-ion batteries can reach temperatures of 1,800 degrees Fahrenheit and sometimes burn for weeks, he said. He also said he didn’t know of one thermal runway event that was ever extinguished by water. The fire only stops when the battery runs out of juice, he said.
Watson’s major emphasis was on the safety of those who would respond to a thermal runaway event, saying that technology surrounding the batteries is changing every day and fire safety codes can’t keep up with it.
Watson agreed that thermal runaway events were worst-case scenarios and didn’t know how many had occurred last year in the nation. In an email the next day, Joint Planning Commissioner Executive Director Brian Bishop said an article he read recently cited 15 such events.
Schneider, at Tuesday’s Fiscal Court meeting, said part of the revised ordinance deals specifically with safety—a “suggested safety guidelines” that is to be compiled by first responders, members of the Fiscal Court, joint planning commission representatives and consultants.
Schneider said the general language in that draft would provide protection to the responders and the public, but allows the zoning process, and in turn, the steps for the battery energy storage system to locate in the county, to continue.
Yellowthroat Energy Storage LLC, a subsidiary of Tenaska Energy, has submitted plans to the joint planning commission staff to build a battery installation on a 35-plus acre parcel on Toy-Anthoston Road, near Airline Road.
In addition to the suggested safety guidelines, Schneider said the revised proposal includes a requirement that the county fire department chief whose district a battery energy storage system will be locating in and the state fire marshal must sign off on the site plan before a permit can be granted.
Schneider and Magistrate Taylor Tompkins said the revised proposal allows the process of approving a zoning ordinance for battery installations to continue but is still mindful of safety. The more detailed suggested safety guidelines will continue to be discussed and then written, and then later amended into the zoning.
“I think we’ve got a good place to start,” Tompkins said.
Schneider also said that the revised proposal is more closely aligned with the city of Henderson’s zoning ordinance for battery energy storage systems.
In the city of Henderson’s zoning for the battery systems, the parcel where a system is to be located must be zoned heavy industrial and there must be 100-foot distance between the battery system and a residence.
Henderson Municipal Power and Light has just signed a deal with NextEra Energy that will allow the company to build a battery energy storage system at Substation #7 on South Green Street.
