WORK has started on the installation of up to 25 HUGE batteries in a field on York’s outskirts in a bid to help protect up to 100,000 homes from power cuts.

The batteries will be sited within steel shipping container-style structures on land next to the electricity sub-station off Hull Road in Osbaldwick.

Their aim will be to ‘buffer’ the National Grid against variations in the generation of electricity through sunlight and wind, City of York Council was informed in a planning application in 2018.

They will be capable of supplying up to 50MW of electrical power into the Grid - enough to supply as many as 100,000 homes for up to an hour at certain times of the day, said the application.

The start of work on the site comes after thousands of properties in the York area suffered power cuts this week, caused by the heatwave.

Antigoni Fakou, of Greece-based Mytilineos' Renewables & Storage Development Business Unit, which will run the site, said yesterday that Mytilineos was a world established contractor, focused on the whole spectrum of solar energy.

"Especially in the United Kingdom, the company has a vast portfolio of energy storage projects as they are an integral part towards the successful energy transition and a key parameter for the transition to low CO2 emissions while they support the increased penetration and the optimization of the operation of RES (renewable energy sources) projects," she said.

"For example, Mytilineos has successfully energized storage systems (Battery Energy Storage Systems) which are supporting increased penetration of intermittent renewables into the United Kingdom’s energy mix, providing ancillary services necessary to ensure the reliability and stability of the grid."

Asked how long the York project would take and when the batteries would be able to store power, she said it was in early stages of design 'but we will inform you more thoroughly in the near future.'

In the 2018 application, applicant UK Battery Storage Ltd said in a supporting document that main substations which could accommodate such electrical capacity were very limited in number and the Osbaldwick site was the only location identified in the York council area with the potential to do so.

The development would be mitigated by screening planting and earthworks and would be temporary, for 20 years, after which the site would be decommissioned and restored to its current state, subject to any planning consent provisions.

The storage containers would have a maximum height of 3.5 metres and be light grey or light green in colour, with the site screened by native trees.

The document added that within 10 years, energy storage facilities were expected to be commonplace and form an integral part of the National Grid’s ability to maintain electricity supply.