Push Power Secures Consent for Essex Solar-Battery Project

• Push Power Ltd wins planning approval for Kentishes Solar Farm in Essex: 16.5MW solar plus a 22.5MWh battery. The third phase of its 2015 site will move to delivery.

Push Power Ltd has secured planning approval for the Kentishes Solar Farm in Essex, including a co-located battery energy storage system. The project pairs 16.5 MW of solar capacity with a 22.5-MWh BESS, marking the third phase of a site the company first developed in 2015.

Braintree District Council granted consent after planning officers said the scheme’s renewable energy and biodiversity benefits outweigh its limited local impacts. Push Power said it intends to proceed with delivery following the approval. The firm, founded in 2014 as a family-owned renewable developer, focuses on developing and constructing field-scale solar assets.

How does planning approval for Kentishes Solar Farm advance Push Power’s solar-plus-BESS plans?

• Demonstrates that Braintree District Council is willing to approve a solar-plus-storage scheme in the local planning context, improving the odds of success for Push Power’s next projects where similar constraints (traffic, visual impact, land use) must be balanced against renewable energy benefits.
  
• Provides a recent, council-approved precedent for the specific “solar + co-located BESS” delivery approach, strengthening Push Power’s planning narrative for future applications that involve grid connection, safety requirements, and battery-specific environmental considerations.
  
• Reduces development risk for Push Power’s wider pipeline by showing the company can successfully address planning officer concerns—especially around limited local impacts—while highlighting biodiversity and mitigation measures as decision-making drivers.
  
• Improves confidence for partners and funders by validating that the company can convert consented land into bankable solar and storage deliverables, which can help accelerate contracting and financing for subsequent BESS-enabled sites.
• Offers practical lessons from the consent process (design adjustments, mitigation strategies, and consultation outcomes) that Push Power can reuse to streamline future planning submissions and shorten timelines.
  
• Builds credibility with local stakeholders by reinforcing that Push Power’s projects can be framed to deliver community and environmental benefits alongside energy generation, supporting smoother engagement on later proposals.
• Reinforces the company’s track record in phased site development: advancing a third phase helps consolidate operational learning and can make future build-out planning, procurement, and construction sequencing easier across the same portfolio.