Decision due within three days on battery storage facility in rural Longford village

A decision is due within the next three days on a battery energy storage facility proposed for a site in Ballykenny, Cloondara.

Ion Renewables Ltd submitted the planning application to Longford County Council seeking permission to construct the battery energy storage facility which will include eighteen 20ft containers with 5 medium voltage transformers, and the construction of a single storey sub-station building along with a GRP kiosk and acoustic fence in addition to all associated development works.

The site, which is owned by Mr David McCann, is situated next to the Richmond 110kV electrical substation.

In a submission to the council, a local man pointed out that the planning application may be incomplete, stating that sections of the technical form were left unexplained and that details such as distances from the proposed battery facility to nearby homes were not provided.

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Ballykenny resident Mr Frank Beirne wrote, “Section two of the last paragraph outlines (is the information submitted substantially incorrect or has substantial information been omitted) and the response to that question is ticked as (YES). The question then is if YES. State reasons - no response has been submitted. Surely this question must be answered to complete the application process?”

Mr Beirne added, “I also wish to point out that no minimum distance has been recorded as part of the process in particular the distance from the plant to the private residence and farm i.e from the outer edge of the battery site to the above.” 

Mr Beirne's submission also pointed out that “no planning permission is evident for the entrance to this site and the original entrance to this block of land is approximately 60 meters further up the road towards Newtownforbes.”

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Another submission, from Ms Eleanor Wauchob, outlined grave concerns with regard to the battery energy storage systems (BESS), namely the thermal runaway.

In her submission, Ms Wauchob wrote that there have been “over 100 incidents of failure in BESS to date. Consequences include death, serious injury, long term health impacts and environmental damage. Details can be found on the Electrical Power Research Institute (EPRI) BESS Failure Incident Database.”

Ms Wauchob added that, “Thermal runaway occurs when a failure of some type leads to overheating within the battery. Causes include physical damage, short circuit, thermal abuse/external heating, water ingress/moisture, internal cell defects, failure of the Battery Management System (BMS), among others.”

Her submission went on to point out that, “overheating results in toxic gas release, fire and potential vapour cloud explosion” and warned, “These fires do not need oxygen to burn, cannot be put out by fire extinguishers and may re-ignite hours or days later."

"The only method of control is by cooling the batteries. Water application is the most effective way of cooling the batteries.”

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Ms Wauchob added, “The environmental consequences of thermal runaway must be considered in the EIA screening."

"Toxic gas, heavy metal particulates and toxic firewater runoff all have the potential to contaminate the environment as illustrated by the Vistra Moss Landing BESS fire in January 2025.” 

In the planning application, there were several reports included, one of which was a fire report conducted by Senior Fire Engineer, David Gannon, of Eamon O’Boyle & Associates.

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Mr Gannon stated in his report that the proposed facility would use lithium iron phosphate (LFP) batteries, which, he said, is “a safer” type of lithium-ion technology that is more stable and “less prone to thermal runaway,” the term given to when a battery cell overheats and is difficult to bring under control, thus potentially resulting in extreme heat, fire, etc.

The report said the design and layout of the facility followed fire safety standards and that the battery units would be housed in enclosures with 60 minutes of fire resistance.

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According to the report, the proposed units would be situated more than 5 metres from nearby buildings or boundaries. The facility would automatically shut down equipment in the event of a fire, and would not contain sprinklers but rather a gas system that would deal with any fire inside the units. Fire brigade access would also be provided to enable the fire service “to flood the container with water in the event of failure of all safety systems.”

Construction of the proposed facility is expected to take 3-4 months to complete. A decision on the application was originally due on November 12 however that has since been extended to this Wednesday, March 11. 

Funded by the Local Democracy Reporting Scheme