Innovative project drives solar energy support for Waste and Recycling station

An energy efficiency scheme is lowering usage and driving down costs at the Council’s Waste and Recycling station.

Denbighshire County Council’s Energy and Fleet teams recently completed a project to install a battery energy storage system (BESS), at the Denbigh based site to improve the harnessing of energy generated by the building’s large array of solar PV panels.

The Council’s Energy team has managed projects across council buildings to improve building energy efficiency and reduce emissions as part of the council’s drive to reduce its carbon footprint after declaring a Climate and Nature Emergency during 2019.

Earlier this year the site at Denbigh saw the installation of 600kWh (3x200 kWh) batteries which received funding support from the Welsh Government’s Energy Service as part of the EVCI & ZEV Grant 25-26 (which funded 90 percent of costs).

These batteries store surplus electricity generated by the PV panels on the station roof during the day so it can be used when the panels aren’t generating to support waste and recycling fleet charging. Stored energy can be used at night or during very cloudy days when the solar panels do not generate enough electricity to run the building, helping maintain lower long term energy usage costs and reducing carbon emissions.

The Energy team have compared data from April to July this year at the site to the same period in 2025 which already shows the system is achieving its goal.

Total usage of grid supplied energy has dropped by over a half with the 2025 period recording 15,282 kWh compared to just 5,395 kWh in 2026.

The average daily use of energy at the Denbigh site has also fallen by over a half, with 166.1 kWh seen for the 2025 period and only 58.6 kWh for 2026.

Waste and Recycling vehicles are all based at the Denbigh site and start and end their operational routes from the station. Recycling and non-recyclable waste is collected by the vehicles and taken back to the Denbigh site for sorting and processing.

This change in efficiency is already helping benefit 15 percent of the fleet which is electric powered (EVs) and charged on site after each daily use for collecting recycling and non-recyclable waste for sorting and processing.

There are 12 chargers installed at the site that will simultaneous charge up to 16 vehicles.

Councillor Barry Mellor, Lead Member for Environment and Transport said: “This innovative work at the site is already helping us reduce carbon emissions and drive down reliance on gird supplied energy, reducing our costs at the waste transfer station. 

“It is fantastic to see this efficiency project running as our Waste and Recycling team is committed to reducing carbon emissions for Denbighshire as a whole. We are very grateful to our Energy and Fleet sections for helping them lead the way to achieve this result at the Denbigh site.”

This innovative work at the Denbigh site is expected to save an additional 76,731kWh per year and increase the onsite utilisation of the solar generation to around 73 percent, saving around £16,113 and 22 tonnes of CO₂ per annum and reducing the amount of low value export of surplus energy to the grid.