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Local volunteer urges stricter state rules for battery energy storage after safety concerns
Summary
Teresa Betold of Snomi Valley for Responsible Energy urged the Covington City Council to press Washington legislators for seven changes to how battery energy storage systems (BES) are sited and regulated, including wider notice, mandatory setbacks from vulnerable facilities, independent testing and requiring local/tribal consent for state approvals.
Teresa Betold, a volunteer with Snomi Valley for Responsible Energy, told the Covington City Council on June 23 that current state processes leave communities exposed to public-safety and environmental risks from utility-scale battery energy storage systems (BES).
Betold laid out seven recommended legislative changes she says would rebuild public trust and reduce risk. She urged that projects denied a local permit not be allowed to shift to the state siting council procedure; that developers be required to notify landowners and governments within five miles of proposed sites; and that mandatory setbacks be imposed from schools, hospitals, correctional and assisted-living facilities.
"For a lithium-ion battery that has around a 720 megawatt hour capacity, there is a 42% chance that it will spontaneously combust within the 20 years that it's in service," Betold said, citing an analysis she had reviewed and asking the council to press for independently verified data rather than developer-supplied assertions.
She also said the state process assigns an applicant-funded attorney to represent environmental interests in some cases, and argued that developers should pay for independent monitoring, testing and public reporting with remediation funded by the companies building the BES. Betold recommended that state protections be a minimum floor and that local governments and tribal nations be allowed to add safeguards tailored to local conditions.
Mayor Smith and other council members asked follow-up questions about the data and the rationale for the recommended distances. Betold said the five-mile notice proposal was informed by evacuation-distance findings from the Moss Landing fire in January 2025 and that setback distance depends on plume behavior and weather; she said the Washington State Parent Teacher Association had discussed a two-mile school setback.
Betold also discussed alternatives to lithium-ion storage that are less likely to pose fire and toxic-emissions risks, including pumped-storage hydro and other mechanical or nonchemical storage technologies, and encouraged the council to consider those options as the city evaluates energy projects.
The council did not take action on the recommendations at the meeting. Betold asked attendees to submit comments to the Clean Energy Siting Council (the transcript uses multiple spellings of the state body) before the councils comment deadline on June 28.
The council thanked Betold for the detailed briefing and asked staff to provide additional information as appropriate.
