SSE Renewables: North Yorkshire village to house one of UK's largest battery storage systems

It is SSE Renewables’ third BESS development to reach this stage, following on from its 50MW Salisbury and 150MW Ferrybridge BESS projects.

Construction will begin in the coming months and the site is expected to be operational by early 2026. It will be located next to National Grid’s substation in Monk Fryston.

Richard Cave-Bigley, Director of Solar & Battery – SSE Renewables, said: “It’s fantastic that we have taken a Final Investment Decision on the Monk Fryston BESS project, one of the largest battery storage projects in the UK.

“This is another positive step towards reaching our net zero targets, enabling us to provide stored energy to the grid and provide balancing energy supply to support intermittent renewable energy generation, and, in doing so, strengthening the UK’s energy security.

“The project team has worked very hard to reach this landmark milestone and I’m looking forward to construction starting in the coming months.”

Finlay McCutcheon, Director of Onshore Renewables, SSE Renewables, said: “Taking a Final Investment Decision on our Monk Fryston project is another very exciting milestone for SSE Renewables and our solar and battery business, which now has four projects in delivery amounting to over half a gigawatt of new solar and battery capacity.

“We are continuing to take action at real pace to rapidly scale up both our installed renewable energy capacity and the associated large-scale energy storage needed to support it, as is demonstrated by our diverse portfolio of projects across onshore and offshore wind, hydro and of course solar and battery.”

Batteries such as the 320MW Monk Fryston project, which can run for up to two hours at a time, will be capable of storing power for release back to the UK national grid when it is needed the most – helping to manage peaks of energy demand.

Battery storage, or battery energy storage systems (BESS), are devices that enable energy from renewables, like solar and wind, to be stored and then released when the power is needed most.