Third Revolution Projects have secured consent for a Battery Energy System via planning committee on a 5.53 hectare site in South Staffordshire Council in April 2025. The proposal will store up to 49.5MW of electricity from the grid.

The scheme went through refinements to the original design informed by stakeholder feedback to overcome challenges relating to ecology, noise, amenity, landscape, green belt and heritage. TRP closely coordinated and advised on these changes to refine the scheme to have least possible impact and bring forward significant benefits to the locality.

One of these design changes involved relocating the battery containers within the site to better reflect community preferences and ecological sensitivities. This design change process involved working closely with landscape consultants, transport consultants, heritage consultants, noise consultants, ecologists and flood consultants to ensure no knock-on effects were caused and the best area for relocation was selected considering all the different disciplines. Additional assessments were carried out successfully to inform the decision.

The relocation of the battery containers also benefitted the local bat population found to be using the recreational woodland during ecological assessments. Though ecologists noted no likely impacts from the development on the bat population, this was a concern raised by the LPA ecologist. Moving the containers allowed for a significant buffer between the development and the woodland.

TRP worked closely with the client, ecologist and landscape consultant to ensure the highest quality landscaping scheme was brought forward bringing synergies to Biodiversity Net Gain (BNG), the local bat population and other local species, landscape, amenity, and to minimise Green Belt impact. This involved incorporating native shrub mix at the woodland edge to minimise visibility alongside woodland planting, species rich grassland, cereal mix and native hedge mix. The scheme also introduces two new ponds onsite.

During determination, the LPA’s Local Plans Department determined the site to meet the definition of the Grey Belt which carried through to the Case Officer’s recommendation for approval which was a huge advantage to have going into planning committee. This alleviated Green Belt concerns and helped reach positive determination amongst members in the planning committee. Overall, it was agreed that the benefits of the development clearly outweigh any harm to the Green Belt.