NORTH KINGSTOWN, R.I. — Officials with the Quonset Development Corporation (QDC) are proposing to build, along Callahan Road, the biggest energy storage facility in Rhode Island.

Filings with the state Energy Facility Siting Board (EFSB) show the quasi-public agency is working with Green Development LLC, a Rhode Island-based developer of ground-mounted solar arrays, to build a lithium iron phosphate battery facility that could draw and discharge up to 208 megawatts (MW) of power to the electric grid.

If approved and built, it would be the second, and biggest, facility of its kind in Rhode Island. The state’s first utility-scale battery storage facility in Pascoag, which became operational in 2022, has a capacity of 3 MW.

Battery storage is a key component of renewable energy systems. As the electric grid switches from fossil fuel-powered plants to wind and solar, it becomes imperative to capture as much excess energy as possible to ensure the greatest amount of efficiency and grid reliability; there’s not always wind and sun to power renewables.

QDC and Green Development are proposing to use 10 acres of land along Callahan Road to build the facility, a site that would require relocating and then demolishing an already existing North Kingstown Fire Station on the property.

The proposal includes building a substation, and 2,500 feet of underground transmission lines that would run underneath Callahan Road, linking to a switchyard that would transmit the electricity via 500 feet of aboveground wires to interconnect with the grid just south of Route 403.

Up to 102 battery-energy-storage units would be built, with an energy-collection system connecting to converter and inverter systems. Each battery segment would be 94 feet long and 8 feet wide.

“The Project will help to ensure that clean energy generated in Rhode Island is used in Rhode Island,” according to the project’s application to the EFSB, “as well as providing a reliable source of dispatchable energy to balance the Rhode Island and the regional New England ISO electrical system that will support the region’s energy goals and policies for a transition to renewable energy resources.”

Rhode Island is only beginning to invest in battery storage. In 2024, the General Assembly passed legislation setting a goal of 90 MW of battery storage by the end of 2026, and 195 MW by the end of 2028.

The state Public Utilities Commission has spent the past two years designing tariffs and payment policies to spur the construction of more battery facilities, although no official policy has been set.

Construction is expected to start later this year, and is expected to finish sometime in summer 2029, with the energy storage facility coming online by the end of the decade. The facility is expected to operate continuously for 25 years, with a power-purchase agreement in effect for the same term. There is an option for three additional five-year terms on the lease for the property.

The project has already completed permit applications for the Department of Environmental Management, the Department of Transportation, the Federal Aviation Administration, and ISO New England.

The estimated cost of the project is unknown, with Green Development and QDC petitioning the EFSB to keep it confidential. According to the application, Green Development “intends to finance the project for construction and operation via a combination of sponsor equity, nonrecourse project finance and tax equity.”

The EFSB has set a preliminary hearing for the project for April 28 at 9:30 a.m.