Cities fight plans for major battery energy storage systems on the fears they are increasing in flames

But as more energy storage is added, residents in certain places repel due to the fears that systems increase in flames, as a massive installation in California did it earlier this year.

Supporters argue that the energy storage systems of the cutting -edge battery are safe, but more localities promulgate moratories.

“We are not guinea pigs for anyone … We are not going to experiment, we are not going to take risks,” said Michael McGinty, the mayor of Island Park, New York, who spent a moratorium in July after a storage system was offered near the village line.

At least a few dozen localities in the United States have evolved to temporarily block the development of major battery systems in recent years.

Long Island, where the electricity network could get a boost in the coming years while offshore wind farms are online, has been an activism home, even by attracting the attention of the Trump administration. The opponents had a boost in August when the administrator of the environmental protection agency Lee Zeldin went to New York to complain that the state has rushed to the approvals of the sites in order to achieve the “delusional” green energy – an affirmation of state officials.

Battery growth push

Battery energy storage systems which aspire a cheap power during periods of low demand, then unloading for profit during periods of high demand, are considered essential with the rise of intermittent energy sources such as wind and solar energy.

Known by the acronym Bess, the systems can make the grids more reliable and have been credited with reduction in power outages. A large battery system can be made up of rows of shipping containers in a fenced batch, the containers containing hundreds of thousands of cells.

China and the United States lead the world by quickly adding battery storage energy systems. However, Saudi Arabia, South Africa, Australia, the Netherlands, Chile, Canada and the United Kingdom have also ordered or started building major projects since 2024, according to Bloombergnef research.

In the United States, California and Texas have been leading battery storage leaders. But other states move quickly, often with systems developed in private. Although the Trump administration has not been favorable or even hostile to renewable energies, the main tax credits for energy storage projects have been maintained in the recently approved federal budget for qualified projects that start construction over the next eight years.

The developers added 4,908 megawatts of battery storage capacity in the second quarter of 2025, Arizona, California and Texas representing about three -quarters of this new capacity, according to an American Clean Power Association report. This is enough to supply nearly 1.7 million households.

New York has an ambitious goal of adding 6,000 energy storage megawatts by 2030, half of large -scale systems.

Lithium-ion fears

Opposition to storage systems generally focuses on the possibility of thermal run, an uncontrolled heating chain reaction which can cause fire or an explosion. The opponents highlight past fires and ask: what if this happens in my neighborhood?

A battery storage system in Moss Landing, California, caught fire in January, sending toxic smoke plumes in the atmosphere and forcing the evacuation of around 1,500 people.

Experts in the field say that battery systems have become safer over the years. Ofodike Ezekoye, combustion expert and mechanical engineering teacher at the University of Texas in Austin, notes that failures are relatively rare, but also that no engineering system is 100% infallible.

“This is a relatively immature technology that matures quickly, so I think there are many really thoughtful researchers and other stakeholders trying to improve the overall security of these systems,” said Ezekoye.

Supporters of batteries storage say that an installation like Moss Landing, where the batteries were stored inside, would not be authorized in New York, which adopted the fire codes which require a design of the modular speaker with a minimum spacing required to prevent fires from spreading.

Block battery systems

People who live near the proposed sites are not always insured.

In the state of Washington, the city of Maple Valley approved a six -month moratorium in July as a means of “protecting us until we know more,” said city director Laura Philpot.

The voters of Halstead, in Kansas, who have a moratorium, will be invited to date ballot if they wish to prohibit the largest battery storage systems inside the city limits, according to Mayor Dennis Travis. He hopes that the city will one day be able to host a storage system designed safely and said local opponents are wrongly attached to the California fire.

The number of localities from moratories began to increase in 2023 and 2024, reflecting trends in the deployment of batteries storage, with a notable group in New York, according to a presentation last year by the Pacific Northwest National Laboratory.

Winnie Sokolowski is one of residents of the region against a proposed lithium-ion storage system of 250 megawatts in the city of Ulster, New York, saying that it is too close to schools and houses.

“They bench on nothing is happening, but I don’t think you can place it where they offer and assume that nothing will happen,” said Sokolowski. “It’s just too risky if it is.”

The developer, Terra-Gen, said that the design would prevent a fire from spreading and that the system “presents no credible and scientific threat to neighbors, the public or the environment”.

The president of the New York State Research and Energy Development Authority, Doreen Harris, said that it was convinced that the State has the right safety rules and that the use of battery storage systems “will strengthen and modernize our network”.

She noted that there were also local concerns in the first stages of the location of solar farms, which have since proven their advantages.