Elkhart committee reviews draft zoning rules for battery energy storage amid safety and grid concerns

Staff and outside experts briefed the Elkhart City Public Health and Safety Committee on battery energy storage systems and draft Unified Development Ordinance language for siting and operating those facilities.

The presentation, given at a committee work session, explained how batteries can provide supplemental grid capacity for regional data-center growth, described industry safety and testing standards, and outlined draft local zoning rules that would treat battery energy storage systems as a special-exception use in the manufacturing district.

The issue matters because county and regional demand for electricity is growing and Elkhart-area leaders said the aging grid and new data-center customers are driving interest in storage. Chris Steger of the Economic Development Corporation of Elkhart County told the committee that “about 70% of our grid is over 25 years old,” and warned that projected demand could increase strain on local service. He said a recent outage on the city’s southeast side cost a group of businesses hundreds of thousands of dollars in lost revenue.

Battery experts described technology, uses and safety protocols. Becca Gillespie of the Battery Innovation Center summarized the basic function: batteries store energy for later use, provide peaking capacity and help frequency regulation. She emphasized two core technical measures for projects — power (megawatts) and energy (megawatt-hours) — and gave the common example of a “10 megawatt, 4 hour” system equal to 40 megawatt-hours.

Lehi Alexander, CEO…