11/04/2023
PAS 63100:2024 is a guidance note from the British Standards Institute on the location of domestic battery storage systems, published 31st March 2024
The basic premise of the guidance is that the best place for storage batteries is outside dwellings and away from habitable rooms.
Section 6.5 (copied below) has a long list of excluded areas for batteries which will make it difficult to find a suitable place inside most dwellings. Outdoor locations are also problematic as most batteries currently available are not fully waterproof and most cannot operate in freezing temperatures.
Battery fires are very rare, but they have a high impact due to their behaviour in a fire and the risks they pose to both occupants and firefighters. Battery storage systems are robustly designed and include extensive protections to manage fire risk, however these cannot make a battery safe in the event of a fire in the property, or if a battery is damaged by a reversing car, for example. The draft guidance allowed batteries in lofts, but these were also excluded in the final guidance due to the risk of batteries (usually weighing 40-100kg) falling in a burning building.
While this is only guidance at the moment, it is likely to be the basis for a future British Standard. Batteries installed in locations prohibited by the guidance may need to be moved at a later date to meet the requirements of insurers & lenders.
GB-Sol strongly recommend that customers intending to install a battery should find a location that meets the new guidelines. For customers who have already had a battery installed, GB-Sol can help review options for relocation.
The full guidance document is available as a free download from knowledge.bsigroup
The following are relevant sections of the guidance, but the full document has much more extensive guidance:
6.5.1 Where practicable, storage batteries shall be installed outdoors.
6.5.5 Batteries shall not be installed in any of the following locations:
a) rooms in which persons are intended to sleep;
b) routes used as a means of escape that are not defined as protected escape routes, including landings, staircases and corridors;
c) corridors, shafts, stairs or lobbies of protected escape routes;
d) firefighting lobbies, shafts or staircases;
e) storage cupboards, enclosures or spaces opening into rooms in which persons are intended to sleep;
f) outdoors (ground-mounted or wall-mounted in a suitable enclosure) within 1 m of:
1) escape routes; 2) doors; 3) windows; or 4) ventilation ports.
g) voids, roof spaces or lofts;
h) within 2 m of stored flammable materials and fuel storage tanks or cylinders; and
i) cellars or basements that have no access to the outside of the building
6.6 Table 5 – Locations requiring protection against mechanical impact
Outdoors – adjacent to a driveway or vehicle parking or movement area, or on walls adjoining public highways
Indoors – within an attached or detached garage, or adjacent to other indoor car parking spaces