The list below is a record of advice the Planning Inspectorate has provided in respect of the Planning Act 2008 process.
There is a statutory duty under section 51 of the Planning Act 2008 to record the advice that is given in relation to an application or a potential application and to make this publicly available. Advice we have provided is recorded below together with the name of the person or organisation who asked for the advice and the project it relates to. The privacy of any other personal information will be protected in accordance with our Information Charter which you should view before sending information to the Planning Inspectorate.
Note that after a project page has been created for a particular application, any advice provided that relates to it will also be published under the ‘s51 advice’ tab on the relevant project page.
Advice given between between 1 October 2009 and 14 April 2015 has been archived. View the archived advice.
General
Enquiry
We are investigating development of an energy storage facility including the installation of up to 50MW lithium-ion battery capacity, with potential for future expansion.
The proposed development does not generate electricity, but rather imports/exports power from the electricity network, and provides a short-term storage medium, with interconnection at voltages ranging between 33 – 275kV.
Advice given
As you state, the storage facilities do not generate electricity, and they do not appear to qualify as a generating station as defined by the Planning Act 2008 (PA2008) (s235). Further, even if the facilities could be considered as a generating station, the stated ‘up to 50MW capacity’ would fall below the ‘more than 50MW’ requirement of the PA2008. Therefore this project as described does not qualify as a generating station under s15 of the PA2008.
You mention cabling of up to 275kV. This does exceed the PA2008 threshold of 132kV in s16(3)(a), but it seems unlikely that the connection would be greater than 2km beyond AES’ premises as required to qualify. If any above ground grid connection of 132kV or greater nominal voltage did exceed 2km beyond the premises, then this would qualify as an NSIP in its own right under s16 of the PA2008.
While the project as described does not appear to be an NSIP, you may request a direction from the Secretary of State for Energy and Climate Change (SoS) for it to be treated as such. The Secretary of State may direct under s35 than any project in the field of energy, transport, water etc be treated as development for which a development consent order is required. If, having assessed consenting routes, AES consider that the scheme would be better dealt with as an NSIP, AES could make a qualifying request to the SoS explaining their reasoning. The SoS will determine this in line with ss35ZA-35A of PA2008.
You can find out more about the NSIP regime on our website at attachment 1, and detailed advice about creating an NSIP application is at attachment 2.
If you would like to explore the NSIP consenting route further, then please let me know. However, it appears that AES’ proposals do not qualify as an NSIP currently.
20/10/16 - Please note that the provisional view set out in this advice that the battery storage project in question would not qualify as a NSIP is currently under review.
