Battery Storage and Associated Infrastructure

Ask for the applicant, landowner, asset owner, operator, maintenance contractor, parent company, funder, planning route, grid connection, capacity in MW, storage duration in MWh, battery chemistry, operating life and permanent 24-hour emergency contact.

A change of company name, owner or operator should never make public accountability disappear.

Ask for one coordinated maximum-design plan showing battery units, chemistry, transformers, inverters, switchgear, substations, control buildings, roads, compounds, drainage, water storage, firewater containment, fencing, lighting, security, landscaping, grid connection, temporary works and off-site works.

Fundamental matters should not be hidden behind “details to follow after consent”.

Ask what function the BESS performs, why the capacity and duration are needed, what search area was used, which alternatives were assessed, whether brownfield or less sensitive land was considered and which harms were avoided through site selection rather than promised mitigation.

A credible alternatives assessment explains criteria, sites considered, reasons for rejection and environmental trade-offs.

Ask for a public site-specific Battery Safety Management Statement and outline Emergency Response Plan. They should cover battery chemistry, testing, detection, monitoring, shutdown, ventilation, gas release, separation, fire spread, explosion risk, wildfire, lightning, technical support, responder access, unstaffed monitoring, prolonged incidents and neighbour notification.

Ask whether the Scottish Fire and Rescue Service has received the actual design information and whether unresolved concerns remain. A statement that “the fire service will deal with it” is not an emergency plan.

Ask what firefighting strategy is assumed, how much water is required, where it comes from, whether it remains available in drought or freezing conditions, what contaminated volume may be produced, how drains are isolated, what containment exists and how polluted water will be tested and removed.

Firewater is not ordinary surface-water runoff. The design must explain what happens if rainfall and an incident occur together or the intended containment is exceeded.

See the full River, Water and Private Supplies guide.

Map rivers, burns, drains, culverts, groundwater, wetlands, springs, wells, boreholes and private water supplies. Ask whether hardstanding changes runoff, foundations alter groundwater and drainage can be isolated during power failure or emergency.

Require baseline and follow-up protection for nearby private supplies.

See the full water guide.

Ask for background measurements during quiet night-time periods and modelling of the whole site at maximum credible operation: cooling, inverters, transformers and substations together.

Ask about tonal, low-frequency and intermittent characteristics, open-window conditions, cumulative development, enforceable limits, post-commissioning monitoring and corrective action after complaints.

Ask for the complete construction and emergency routes, vehicle numbers, abnormal-load details, bridge and culvert checks, winter and flooding resilience, school and farm movements, turning space and an alternative route if the main access is blocked.

See the full Roads, Bridges and Construction Traffic guide.

Ask whether the site was selected to minimise visibility or whether screening is being used to rescue a poor location. Require representative viewpoints, winter and summer views, night-time visualisations, cumulative infrastructure and realistic year-one planting.

Check whether fencing, lighting, CCTV, acoustic walls or vegetation create new impacts or conflict with fire access, surveillance and wildfire control.

Ask how soil, drainage, agriculture, habitat links, lighting, species and restoration shaped the site—not merely how impacts will be mitigated later. Include access tracks, cable trenches, compounds and other ground disturbance.

Check designated and undesignated heritage, old routes, field systems, local names, settings and chance-find procedures.

See the full Archaeology and Historic Landscape guide.

Ask whether the BESS depends on or enables a substation, overhead line, underground cable, access road, renewable generation, another battery phase, private wire, generator, industrial development or future high-demand use.

Ask which parts are in this application, which are separate, which are foreseeable, what maximum scenario is realistic and who assesses the combined landscape, traffic, noise, water, ecology, emergency and community effects.

Do not claim a future use without evidence. Do insist that foreseeable connected development is not hidden by separate applications.

For the campaign's wider framework, see the Full Impact Ledger, Community Shadow EIA and Strategic Dependency Watch.

Ask who owns and operates the asset, whether the applicant is a special-purpose company, what parent guarantee and insurance exist, who pays uninsured losses, how obligations transfer after a sale, where maintenance records are kept and who can require corrective action.

Separate enforceable conditions from voluntary promises.

Ask what happens to batteries, transformers, foundations, cabling, hardstanding, fencing, drainage and contaminated land. Require a reviewed, index-linked financial guarantee capable of surviving insolvency and ownership change.

The amount should cover removal, waste handling, restoration, aftercare, monitoring and professional costs. The public should not inherit a failed industrial site.