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Solano supervisors adopt new rules for large battery storage, restricts siting on farm and residential zones
Summary
The Solano County Board of Supervisors on Oct. 28 adopted a permanent ordinance amending county zoning rules to regulate large, grid-serving battery energy storage systems, barring siting on agricultural and residential lands and imposing fire- and safety-related conditions.
The Solano County Board of Supervisors on Oct. 28 adopted a permanent ordinance amending Chapter 28 to regulate large, grid-serving battery energy storage systems (BESS) after two years of study and public outreach.
County planning staff and consultants told the board the ordinance responds to safety concerns raised by recent thermal-runaway incidents elsewhere in the state and to a new state permitting path that can transfer approval authority to the California Energy Commission. “Thermal runaway ... is an uncontrollable increase in temperature and a release of energy in these batteries,” said Eric Heggstrom, associate planner, during the staff presentation, describing the risk the ordinance targets.
The ordinance applies only to front-of-meter systems with a capacity greater than 1,000 kilowatt-hours (about the size of an electric-vehicle battery pack). It prohibits siting BESS in agricultural, residential,…
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