The closure of the last coal-fired power plant in the United Kingdom raises questions about how the fossil fuel-based energy infrastructure can be repurposed. One option would be to use it to store energy from renewable sources.
The turbines of the Ratcliffe-on-Soar power plant in Nottinghamshire, England, fell silent for good on Monday, and no more smoke and steam will rise from its huge stacks. The plant, which has been operating since 1967, has been closed and will undergo a two-year decommissioning and demolition process.
It is a symbolic moment marking the UK's path towards a decarbonized economy with zero polluting emissions.
For centuries, coal was the main source of energy on the island - until the 1960s, almost 90% of the UK's electricity was based on coal. Now, for the first time in its history, the country will no longer rely on coal to generate electricity.
It is not yet known what will happen to the Ratcliffe-on-Soar power plant. One proposal is to host a prototype reactor or green energy projects here. As more and more power plants around the world close, the question arises: what will happen to these industrial dinosaurs?
A promising option is to transform old power plants into battery units for storing green energy, as reported by BBC.
We need energy storage solutions
Renewable energy sources, such as wind and solar power, are the cornerstone of the net-zero transition. They do not emit greenhouse gases, so the more they replace fossil fuels like coal and gas, the closer we get to zero emissions.
The share of energy obtained from renewable sources is on a constant rise. According to a report by the International Energy Agency published in January, renewable sources will provide 33.5% of global electricity this year and could represent 41.6% by 2028.
However, the use of renewable sources poses challenges for electricity grids. Coal and gas power plants can be turned on and off at any time to provide more energy when needed. In contrast, renewable sources are intermittent and less controllable: the sun does not shine at night, and the wind does not always blow, and sometimes it can blow too much.
To some extent, the intermittency issue can be managed by having a diverse selection of renewable sources: so if one does not produce enough, another can cover the shortfall. Nuclear energy, which does not produce carbon emissions, also provides a constant supply.
In addition, many countries are investing heavily in energy storage. When excess energy is generated that is not needed, it can be stored, and when there is a production deficit, it can be delivered to the system.
For many decades, the most important form of energy storage has been pumped hydroelectricity. However, this will not be sufficient for the renewable era, and hydroelectricity also has its own emission problems.
Therefore, many countries are turning to battery energy storage systems (BESS) instead. A BESS station is simply a series of large batteries, roughly the size of shipping containers. Excess electricity from renewable sources can be moved into batteries and discharged when demand is high.
"In the last 20 years, this technology has improved significantly. Control is more precise, and the cost has also decreased," says Grazia Todeschini, an electrical engineer at King's College London in the UK.
And one of the coal-fired power plants already closed in the UK is being transformed into a huge battery.
The Ferrybridge Example
Near Ferrybridge in West Yorkshire, the remnants of a trio of coal-fired power stations can be found. It operated for almost a century, with the first one starting in 1927 and the last one being decommissioned in 2016. The third station, Ferrybridge C, came under the ownership of the energy company SSE in 2004, which operated it until closure and demolition.
Now, SSE is building a BESS station on the site of the Ferrybridge C plant. It will have a capacity of 150 megawatts, which the company estimates will be sufficient to power 250,000 homes. Construction started in August 2023, and the first batteries arrived in June 2024. The last of the 136 battery units were installed the following month.
Building a battery unit on the site of an old coal-fired power plant has multiple advantages, says Heather Donald, director at SSE Renewables. "Firstly, there is a grid connection there. So connecting the BESS to the grid is as straightforward as it gets. Access to grid connections and network capacity is very high now," she explained.
The site has also proven to be a valuable resource, full of useful materials and infrastructure. "We managed to use some of the existing concrete foundations, we were able to reuse some of the concrete on-site," Donald said. This way, the company did not have to import many materials apart from the batteries themselves.
The Rise of Giant Batteries
If the UK wants to achieve its decarbonization goals, it will need many more BESS projects like the one in Ferrybridge, BBC notes.
According to a report released in July 2024 titled "Future Energy Scenarios," the UK had a battery storage capacity of 4.7 gigawatts (GW) in 2023. This is significant, but the government has set a mandatory target to reach net-zero emissions by 2050.
Depending on how this process unfolds, the country will need a storage capacity between 29 gigawatts and 36 gigawatts by 2050.
A lower figure could be possible, but only if the UK develops hydrogen energy. Currently, most hydrogen comes from fossil fuel sources, so a transition to greener alternatives is necessary. If the alternative represented by green hydrogen does not materialize, the country will need more BESS to compensate.
In short, the UK's BESS storage capacity needs to increase six to twelve times over the next quarter-century.
This is why many other BESS stations are in the works in the UK. With the significant increase in required battery capacity, decommissioned power plants like Ferrybridge C are an attractive option.
It must be noted, however, that not all former coal-fired power plants are suitable for becoming BESS units. "It depends a lot on the location," says Todeschini. For example, a location far from residential areas may not be suitable. Instead, such places could be repurposed as wind farms or other forms of generation. Todeschini also suggests transforming them into charging stations for electric vehicle fleets.
What matters, however, is the trend. Many former fossil fuel power plants around the world are being repurposed for batteries - for example, in Germany, Australia, the United States.
And as more of these projects emerge, they will only get better, argues Donald. "It is clearly a developing technology," she says. Her expectations are for BESS stations to become more efficient and able to discharge electricity for longer periods, helping ensure a secure electricity supply after all power plants are permanently shut down.
T.D.