Spearmint Energy gets greenlight for Texas City BESS, as a further 860MW+ of capacity withdrawn from ERCOT queue 

“We got feedback [on our initial proposal] from the City which we took back to the drawing board and found a site that addressed all the concerns – we’re confident that we did a solid job of finding a remote location that meet all your needs,” said Spearmint’s VP of development, Nick Coil, at the recent Commissioners meeting. 

Following on from several widely-reported fires of battery storage systems, some jurisdictions of authority across North America have grown wary of siting BESS in residential areas, with some introducing bans and restrictions. 

During July, Energy-Storage.news reported on the Town of Southampton in Suffolk County, NY, which effectively banned utility-scale storage facilities destined for residential zones. 

At the recent Texas City Commissioners meeting, Mayor Dedrick Johnson addressed this matter by pointing out that the City “doesn’t have any battery storage systems in any neighbourhoods, nor [does it] plan on having any.”  

Spearmint’s Red Egret BESS project is slated for a 38-acre site located on the northwestern outskirts of Texas City in an area zoned for heavy industrial use. The developer states that it chose this location due to the “high energy use and projected growth in the area.”   

According to planning documents filed with its application, Spearmint has modelled the project using Sungrow’s Powertitan 2.0 BESS units. As part of a battery supply agreement announced last August, Sungrow is supplying over 1GWh of its BESS technology for Spearmint’s portfolio of Texan projects. 

Ringing endorsement for Spearmint BESS  

During the public hearing aspect of the recent meeting, long-term resident of Texas City Barabra White urged the Commissioners to approve the project after what she had witnessed in previous years.  

“I’ve lived through hurricane after hurricane in Texas City, sitting in the dark after days and weeks when it was too hot to breathe, watching my food spoil and making life miserable and costly for working families,” explained White. 

“The Red Egret project would give us something we desperately need – reliable back-up power when extreme weather hits our community [during] summer and winter.” 

Spearmint’s Red Egret project will be connected to the Electric Reliability Council of Texas (ERCOT)-controlled grid, which has historically struggled to cope in times of extreme weather.  

“Spearmint Energy has been completely open about the project and their safety protocols, they’ve answered every tough question thrown at them at community meetings, plus this will bring in needed tax revenue for our schools and our city,” said White. 

With many similar recent public hearings in the US being filled with mostly anti-BESS sentiment, such a ringing endorsement highlighting the endorsements of the technology is refreshing to see.  

Following the hearing, the board unanimously approved Spearmint’s rezoning request for its Red Egret project, which is scheduled for commercial operations during the final quarter of 2026 at the earliest. 

860MW+ of BESS capacity withdrawn from ERCOT 

In related news, recent data published by ERCOT shows a large volume of BESS capacity being withdrawn from the interconnection’s process. 

According to the most recent ERCOT interconnection queue, seven BESS projects were withdrawn from the interconnection process during the month of July representing a cumulative storage capacity of 864.3MW. 

Some industry commentators have recently highlighted a concerning trend of large volumes of BESS capacity being withdrawn from the ERCOT’s interconnection queue.  

Many have blamed this phenomenon on the implementation of the Trump Administration’s “Big Beautiful Bill” and increasing tariffs on foreign-made imports, which has increased the risk for BESS development, possibly leading to increasing numbers of project cancellations. 

The below graph illustrates the BESS capacity withdrawn from the ERCOT queue this year by month, which shows a large peak occurring during April which has then slowly decreased each month until now. 

Source: Electric Reliability Council of Texas (ERCOT) 

Although the peak that occurred during the month of April could highlight the impacts of increasing tariffs and new Government legislation, a developer’s decision to withdraw a project from the queue encompasses a whole host of other factors.