There has been a lot of finger-pointing over groundwater contamination stemming from a 2023 fire at a battery energy storage site on Cove Hollow Road in East Hampton. Initial suspicion about the pollution’s cause was on the batteries themselves, and later on chemicals used to combat a 2023 fire there.
The New York State Department of Environmental Conservation recently said that a waterless firefighting compound was the source. And 3M, the company that made the chemical, sold under the name Novec 1230, has said it is ending new sales due to regulators’ growing concerns about per- and polyfluoroalkyl substances, or PFAS.
Last week, the East Hampton Town Board voted to sue NextEra Energy, the company that co-manages the Cove Hollow Road facility with National Grid, as well as one near Fort Pond in Montauk, unless it ceased operations. NextEra denied that the situation warranted shutting down the two sites. Nonetheless, according to town officials, it did just that after receiving word of the potential lawsuit. East Hampton is up against a formidable opponent if the matter ends up in court. NextEra Energy is a publicly traded company that, while it has generally underperformed when compared to broader energy-sector funds, is no small player.
Among other plans, NextEra is seeking regulatory approval for a $67 billion acquisition of Dominion Energy in Virginia. The merger would result in the largest United States electricity producer, combining both natural gas and nuclear power plants in one company. The plan has not gone down well with some members of Congress, who warned, in a letter to the Federal Energy Regulatory Commission, that it could lead to yet-higher electricity costs.
Meanwhile, as the town and East Hampton Village wonder what to do about the NextEra energy battery storage facilities, the East Hampton School Board is seeking guidance on evacuation planning, should the Cove Hollow Road installation catch fire again. All three of the East Hampton public schools are within a mile and a half of the site; the high school is less than a mile away and directly in the path of the prevailing wind.
All of this points to the need for a stronger regulatory hand from the State of New York. At present, battery facilities are mostly reviewed at a local level, which means that the same agencies that would look over your plan for a backyard deck also have to grapple with these highly complex sites as well. This is one instance in which outside expertise is necessary. So far, there have been limited efforts at oversight among Albany lawmakers. The challenges posed by battery storage sites will have to be dealt with as ever more energy projects are shoehorned into densely populated parts of the state.