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Bear Valley Electric briefs council on safety record, solar and battery proposals
Summary
Bear Valley Electric Services updated the council on safety and grid-hardening efforts, reported 426 days without an accident-related injury and discussed a 5 MW solar project and a 20 MWh battery proposed for the local power plant; company representatives said the battery will use iron-phosphate chemistry and noted continued coordination with San Bernardino County on permitting.
Bear Valley Electric Services told the Big Bear Lake City Council that public and worker safety remains the utilitys top priority during a presentation that outlined recent mitigation work and proposed projects to improve local resilience.
Paul Marconi, the utilitys president, said the company has gone "426 days accident injury free" and noted it has not caused a wildfire. He described aggressive vegetation management, circuit inspection programs, and conductor upgrades the utility says increase threshold performance for high-wind events. "When the PSPS happens . . . we would make every notification possible early to customers and local government," Marconi said, using the abbreviation PSPS for planned power-safety shutoffs.
On generation and distributed resources: Marconi said the utility has applied to the California Public Utilities Commission for a 5-megawatt solar project on Irwin Ranch Road and plans to build a battery storage system at its power plant with approximately 20 megawatt-hours of capacity. "The only discharge is 8.2 megawatts per hour, that's 10 hours," he said, describing battery sizing and discharge duration. In response to safety concerns, Marconi said the planned battery chemistry is iron-phosphate, which the company expects reduces fire risk compared with some other chemistries.
Council members asked for logistics and safety information, including where the Bear Valley generator is located and whether the battery could be sited away from denser downtown areas. Marconi pointed to the plants commercial-generation zoning and noted coordination with fire officials and operators to ensure safe installation and operation.
Marconi also described work with Southern California Edison to increase line capacity and hardening of lines into town; he said several consent-agenda items related to the projects were on tonights agenda and expected to be approved.
Whats next: Council approved the consent calendar that includes related items; staff said they will continue permitting work with county agencies and refine operator and emergency coordination for the new resources.
