Chatterley Whitfield

Details

Background

Chatterley Whitfield is a disused former colliery owned and managed by Stoke-on-Trent City Council within a wider setting of a 100-hectare country park, with some former mining buildings and structures designated as a Scheduled Monument.

The site is located on the urban edge of the city, between residential neighbourhoods and rolling countryside, and this project is designed to attract investment to support local economic growth and drive prosperity.

The opportunity

This will become part of a multi-faceted Digital and Energy Growth zone for Stoke-on-Trent, an internationally significant development with substantial electrical grid headroom for digital developments offering a unique opportunity for the research and exploitation of geothermal heat from the mine water in the deep mine shafts and workings, the potential for energy storage and utilising its size and National Grid connectivity for solar energy production.

The Black to Green Eco Park has substantial electrical grid headroom for digital developments. The National Grid have confirmed that 50MW is available quickly with a planned route through 100MW to 150MW being economically deliverable, and the site has been designated as ‘Strategic to nation or region’, acknowledging its readiness for data centre use.

An integrated renewable energy scheme also offers the potential to recover heat from former mine workings for use in both the site buildings and through a District Heat Network (DHN). Data centres would provide additional waste heat for the DHN system, while mine water could enable their direct cooling sustainably, more cost effectively and with less grid energy needed. Part of the site is also in final development of a 10MW solar PV farm and a 49MW Battery storage system, with a 20MW CHP peaking plant already in operation.