Require a gas unit to add 90 MW of batteries to renew its air permit, group says

When a New Jersey gas unit’s air pollution permit is up for renewal, state law allows the public to recommend ways for the unit to reduce its emissions, such as adding batteries. That’s what one group has done.

December 15, 2025 William Driscoll

Image: Wikimedia Commons / Qurren

Clean Energy Group has called on New Jersey regulators to require Calpine Mid-Atlantic Generation, the owner of a gas-fired generating unit in Vineland, New Jersey, to install “at minimum” a 90 MW, 720 MWh battery storage system next to the unit, to reduce the unit’s level of operation and its air pollution burden on the community.

A battery system of that size would “cover 82 percent of events in which the gas unit is called upon” and would reduce NO_x, CO₂ and SO₂ emissions by about 55%, the group said in a regulatory filing. A 12-hour battery system would reduce emissions by more than 70%.

NO_xreacts with oxygen in the air to produce ozone, which is unhealthy to breathe. Clean Energy Group said that “based on Calpine’s own survey of community stressors, the Vineland community currently experiences significant adverse stress from ground-level ozone.”

Under New Jersey’s Environmental Justice Law, Calpine or any applicant seeking to renew a generating unit’s Title V operating permit under the federal Clean Air Act must publish an environmental justice impact statement, receive public comments on that statement, and then publish written responses to the comments, said Clean Energy Group Project Director Abbe Ramanan.

The New Jersey Department of Environmental Protection then considers the public comments and the applicant’s responses when deciding whether to impose any environmental conditions that must be met to renew the permit, Ramanan said.

Clean Energy Group conducted an analysis finding that hybridizing the Calpine gas unit with battery storage is both economically and technically feasible.

Calpine did not immediately respond to a request for comment.

Feasibility

Calpine’s peaker gas unit is on a 55-acre parcel, providing room for battery storage, CEG said. The unit’s point of interconnection has capacity for 90 MW, and a battery system sized to share that interconnection could use grid operator PJM’s Surplus Interconnection Service, “which would qualify for expedited review by PJM outside the interconnection queue,” the group said.

An eight-hour battery installation would cost about $2,800/kW, CEG said, citing Annual Technology Baseline data published by the National Renewable Energy Laboratory (since renamed). The group also reported costs and emissions reductions for four-hour and 12-hour storage, saying the costs “are not unreasonable, particularly given the significant beneficial impact on local air pollution emissions.”

A battery system could charge during periods of high renewable energy production, the group said, helping to minimize curtailment of those resources and “reducing any potential embodied emissions from grid charging of the batteries.”

Installing “at minimum” a 90 MW, 720 MWh battery system “should be imposed as an environmental justice special condition” for the renewal of the gas unit’s Title V permit, the group said.

Clean Energy Group said in its filing that it has partnered with the New York Power Authority “to successfully advocate” for the retirement of NYPA’s peaker plants and their replacement with battery storage.

This content is protected by copyright and may not be reused. If you want to cooperate with us and would like to reuse some of our content, please contact: editors@pv-magazine.com.