The Scottish government has consented a 228MW/456MWh battery energy storage project (BESS) to be constructed and operated by developer Kona Energy.
The 2-hour Smeaton BESS in East Lothian is strategically located to enhance grid resilience and reduce grid constraints, Kona said. The nearby Torness nuclear power station is due to shut down in 2028, which will increase the utility of the Smeaton BESS, it added.
Kona did not say when it expected the project to come online, but said it would now be seeking investment to bring the project to market.
A ‘Landscape and Visual Impact Assessment’ filing on the Scottish government’s Energy Consents Unit website reveals the Smeaton project is planned to have 75 arrays of battery units each of which will be connected to a ‘power station’, of power conversion system (PCS) unit. Each array comprises 20 battery cabinets of 1.3m x 1.3m x 2.3m.
There is a substantial need for large-scale BESS in Scotland to help balance out the regional disparity of supply and demand in the UK.
A huge portion of the UK’s current and future wind generation is in Scotland, but more demand is from England. This leads to huge amounts of curtailment because of transmission constraints, where the transmission system operator (TSO) National Grid, via the National Energy System Operator (NESO), pays operators to reduce or stop generation.
This article was originally published on Energy-Storage.News.
