All it took was an internal cell failure within one battery cell to have a catastrophic accident.
When the McMicken Energy Storage facility that APS operated near Grand Avenue and Deer Valley Road exploded in 2019, it badly injured four Peoria firefighters and hospitalized four firefighters from Surprise.
The facility was a battery energy storage system, also known as BESS, or facilities that house electrochemical lithium-ion batteries to store solar energy in the daytime for when the sun goes down or future needs.
