Trenton -- A battery storage facility is taking shape in the former shadow of the recently demolished Trenton Channel Power Plant, symbolizing a new era of energy generation that promotes renewable power over fossil fuels.
DTE Energy considers the battery plant integral to a cleaner electricity grid. It will store power generated by wind turbines and solar panels when demand is low and spit the reserves back onto the grid when demand is high, helping to match the availability of electricity with people's use of it.
But the specter of an inferno erupting -- as happened at the Vistra Energy battery power storage facility in Moss Landing, California, in mid-January -- has made DTE's plans a "hot topic" among some Downriver residents, Trenton Fire Chief Keith Anderson said.
The high-profile blaze at the California battery storage facility in January was difficult to extinguish and caused evacuations, a highway closure and warnings from emergency responders to avoid soot or ash from the fire. Officials haven't identified a cause. The fire reignited Feb. 18 but was contained.
The fire has had ripple effects. The California Public Utilities Commission has proposed creating new standards for maintaining and operating battery storage facilities as well as increasing oversight of emergency response plans, while a lawmaker called on Vistra Energy to abandon other battery projects in the state.
"The Moss Landing facility has represented a pivotal piece of our state's energy future, however this disastrous fire has undermined the public's trust in utility-scale lithium-ion battery energy storage systems," California State Assembly member Dawn Addis, D-Morro Bay, said in a letter requesting an investigation into the fire. "If we are to ensure California moves its climate and energy goals forward, we must demonstrate a steadfast commitment to safety, environmental stewardship, transparency, accountability, and emergency prevention.
But Trenton's Anderson said he doesn't believe the same scenario will unfold in the Downriver community because DTE's battery plant will incorporate key updates that are designed to protect against similar blazes.
"There's a lot of eyes on this," he said. "We have looked at the scenarios, the situations that have arose out west, and we picked at this one pretty hard to try and figure out what can we do and what can't we do."
Trenton vs. Moss Landing
Anderson and DTE officials laid out some of the things he said should make the Trenton battery storage facility less fire-prone than the Moss Landing facility.
In California, the 750-megawatt battery storage site was indoors, Anderson said. In contrast, DTE is separating its battery cells into smaller containers that each are outfitted with heat, fire and smoke detection and separated to deter fire from leaping from one to the other.
If a battery inside one of those containers overheats, the rest can be shut down to prevent further problems, DTE officials said. If a blaze sparks in one container, its neighboring container is far enough away that the fire shouldn't spread. Each container has fire suppression inside.
DTE also is using a different form of lithium-ion battery made with lithium, ion and phosphate, which are more stable than those made with nickel, manganese and cobalt like those used at Moss Landing, said Terri Schroeder, DTE's director of energy storage.
That makes for a less fire-prone setup, Anderson said.
"Even though they were put in in 2020 (in Moss Landing), those were old technology for energy storage," he said. "Just a different chemical compound than what they're using now."
Anderson worked closely with DTE and other city officials to review the battery facility design and develop an emergency action plan, he said. Trenton firefighters have walked through the battery storage site and received response training from engineers.
Once the plant is online next year, DTE will meet annually with local first responders to review training and discuss potential updates to the response plan for each site, utility spokesman Chris Lamphear said.
'You don't think coal burns?'
Anderson acknowledged that new technology like battery storage plants can be unsettling for neighbors, but also said he sees a clear upside in dealing with new battery cells compared with the piles of flammable coal that powered the near century-old Trenton Channel Power Plant.
"I feel safer with the battery system than I do the coal-burning power plant," he said. "A coal dust explosion is a very scary thing."
The Trenton Channel Power Plant was demolished last year with a series of implosions that took down the plant's iconic red-and-white smoke stacks and its boiler house. The boiler house blast released a huge, billowing cloud of black smoke.
DTE and other Michigan utilities are ditching coal, a highly polluting source of electricity, and replacing it with cleaner sources of power such as renewables paired with battery storage and sometimes natural gas. By 2042, DTE plans to have 2,950 megawatts of energy storage, more than doubling its current storage capacity.
Paul Gloor, a Grosse Ile resident and president of the Grosse Ile Nature and Land Conservancy, expressed a similar perspective on the environmental and safety impact of batteries versus coal.
He said people might be more comfortable with fossil fuels because they are familiar, but that doesn't make them safer.
"The coal plant polluted our neighborhoods for 100 years," Gloor said. "You don't think coal burns?"
'Endless loop' of fire
Still, it is reasonable for people to seek details about battery energy storage facilities built in their neighborhoods, said Reeja Jayan, a mechanical engineering professor at Carnegie Mellon University in Pittsburgh who researches and designs batteries.
Although individuals are used to the small versions in electronics such as cellphones, lithium-ion batteries are touchy and prone to catching fire, Jayan said.
"In batteries, once a fire starts, you have all of these ingredients available there and they keep feeding each other in an endless loop called a thermal runaway, and there's no putting that out," she said.
That is a bigger issue as batteries grow to power cars and the power grid, the Carnegie Mellon expert said, but judicious planning can prevent large-scale battery fires.
Jayan recommended facilities monitor battery temperature and install fire detection systems that can react to things like smoke and prevent a full-scale blaze. She also recommended the facilities put smaller numbers of batteries in separate containers, then space those containers out to prevent a fire from spreading. Containers should be ventilated.
Buying high-quality equipment from reputable manufacturers also is key for safety, she said.
"I think the public deserves these answers, and if they don't get it, they should push and ask for them and (be updated about) all of these practices on a regular basis," Jayan said. "I think there are many great storage facilities all over the world. This is the future."
DTE is taking those protective steps, said Schroeder and Michael Banks, director of major projects for the utitilty.
Trenton fire officials and DTE added protective measures that go beyond what is required by the fire code, Anderson said.
For example, the battery containers will have thermal imaging designed to detect the temperatures of batteries and disconnect them before any spark.
Because of the time required to understand new technology, seek public comments and review plans, it could take years for the National Fire Protection Association to update its fire codes to address new technology such as advances in battery builds. By the time a new code is published, it could be three years outdated, Anderson said.
"Battery energy storage, it's kind of like a new frontier in the energy world," Anderson said. "That stuff is evolving so fast that some of the codes can't keep up. It changes so quickly."
For example, the current fire code still talks about using water to suppress lithium-ion battery fires, DTE's Banks said. But water sometimes can unleash more toxins from the batteries.
On the flip side, Anderson said water could help firefighters stop more material from catching flame, reducing the overall size of a burn. He said using water would be a "last ditch effort" to contain a fire.
Trenton site design details
The 220-megawatt, 20-acre battery storage plant known as the Trenton Channel Energy Center will be DTE's first large-scale solar project, DTE's Schroeder said, but not its last.
The facility is scheduled to go online in 2026 and is designed to charge and discharge energy every day, so it can support daily grid functions.
DTE is buying the equipment from Powin, an Oregon-based battery supplier. The equipment has undergone fire testing by the company, Anderson said.
The energy storage center will house a total of roughly 1 million battery cells, which will be divided into 1,250 "segments" that are 8 feet square and 10 feet tall, each one organized like a pantry, Schroeder said. Each will be airtight, have heating and cooling and an aerosol fire suppression system.
Those segments will be lined up in rows.
The Trenton Channel Energy Center is across Jefferson Avenue from a smaller DTE battery storage facility, the Slocum Battery Energy Storage System. That smaller plant was built in 2024 to replace a diesel "peaker" plant that used to kick on during high-use periods to supplement electricity.
The Trenton Channel Energy Center has a very similar design to the Slocum system, Schroeder said.
Adding more batteries to Trenton made sense, Banks said. It's land DTE already owns and has developed, and it has a strong grid connection from the coal days. He likened it to an outlet in a wall.
"The outlet's there. It can handle the power, and you can pull power from it," Banks said. "That's one of the main points of why we utilized Trenton. The infrastructure that was there on the transmission grid ... still is fully operational, still capable of providing beneficial use."