Energy supplier SSE Renewables has announced its second former coal-fired power station site at Ferrybridge, west Yorkshire, will house a 150MW grid-scale battery. The firm’s second device will have three times the power of its first storage venture.
The company said work on its second battery installation will begin next month at the site near Pontefract. Full commissioning is due next year.
Ferrybridge’s furnaces went cold in 2016, and much of its infrastructure was demolished last year. SSE has had to re-apply for a grid connection.
The link is confirmed for June 2024, and the project is expected to be fully operational six months later.
Pre-construction contracts have now been signed. The battery system is being developed in conjunction with technology supplier Sungrow Power and builders OCU Services. Sungrow’s PowerTitan system will cool the installation.
Last summer SSE announced Salisbury, Wiltshire as the site for its first infrastructure supporting battery, a 50MW installation to be managed by contractors Wärtsilä. The unit is scheduled to go live this September.
SSE says it is investing £25bn this decade through its Net Zero Acceleration Programme to accelerate Britain’s and Ireland’s transition. It promises 1,000 green jobs will be created each year.
Last week SSE announced it was rolling its solar and battery unit into its renewables division, speeding development of its pipeline of battery & solar projects in Britain and Ireland. It cast the move as a springboard for expansion into continental Europe.
“Reaching a final decision for our Ferrybridge battery storage project is another exciting landmark for us”, said Richard Cave-Bigley, the unit’s director.
Yorkshire and Humberside are also home to Europe’s biggest grid-scale storage device so far. Commissioned in November, Harmony Energy’s 196MWh Pillswood project stands next to the Creyke Beck substation in Hull.
As the epochal shift to intermittent renewables progresses, suppliers see battery expansion as irreversible.
Two weeks ago EDF announced its latest utility-strength battery solution, its sixth co-developed with Wärtsilä. The 57MW/114 MWh installation will be built at Bramford, Suffolk, close to a solar farm planned by EDF. Subject to planning approval, the battery and farm will go live early next year.
In 2021 Pivot Power, also part of EDF, connected Britain’s first battery direct into the high voltage grid. It linked a 48MW/50MWh lithium-ion device into a substation at Cowley, Oxford.
