AS HOST TO the largest battery storage facility in the world, on a site that just had its fourth fire in four years, the people of Monterey County have grown to realize that Moss Landing is a learning laboratory for California’s green energy transition.
At a media briefing Wednesday, county officials and representatives of Vistra’s Moss Landing battery facility listed the lessons learned from the Jan. 16 fire.
Some of the issues that arose were the need for better emergency response plans, better monitoring, better architecture and better public health preparedness. Moss Landing is also the location for an adjacent PG&E battery facility.
“The facility emergency plan outlines suppression efforts for overheated but not actively burning batteries,” said Joel Mendoza, fire chief for the North County Fire Protection District. “However, upon arrival, the batteries that we encountered were already in thermal runaway.”
Thermal runaway is a condition where fire in one battery unit spreads to neighboring batteries. The gases released pose significant risk to responders. Putting water on it would have released dangerous steam and runoff. Mendoza and his crew focused on containing the fire while letting it burn out.
“There is always room for improvement,” Mendoza said. “We will continue to conduct a thorough review of the incident and incorporate lessons learned to ensure that we have a better response in the future.”
“It’s important to note that the network that we currently have was not designed to look at fires from the battery plant. … We weren’t situated directly adjacent to the facility, but we had monitors in the surrounding areas.” Richard Stedman, Monterey Bay Air Resources District
There have been at least five environmental tests conducted so far, according to Monterey County spokesperson Nicholas Pasculli. The county welcomed all testing by public and private groups to build a better data pool.
Air monitoring by the federal Environmental Protection Agency between Jan. 17 and Jan. 20 showed that hydrogen fluoride and particulate matter posed no threat to the public health. Those were the most dangerous emissions. But local air monitoring by the Monterey Bay Air Resources District lacks the ability to measure emissions from battery fires.
“It’s important to note that the network that we currently have was not designed to look at fires from the battery plant,” said Richard Stedman from the air district. “We weren’t looking at heavy metals. We weren’t looking at hydrochloric acid or any kind of lithium oxide or anything like that. We weren’t situated directly adjacent to the facility, but we had monitors in the surrounding areas.”
Seeking more monitoring and resources
In a Jan. 21 public statement, state Sen. John Laird, D-Monterey, listed a number of changes he is asking of Vistra. They include:
• Providing the Monterey Bay Air Resources District with sufficient SPM Flex gas detectors to effectively track hydrogen fluoride levels
• Collaborating with the North County Fire Protection District to expand their capacity and readiness to respond to fires of this scale
• Initiating additional environmental monitoring and testing such as air, soil, water, and particulate matter assessments
• Presenting emergency safety plans required under Senate Bill 38 at a public forum to increase transparency and accountability.
Laird in 2023 authored SB 38, which requires battery storage facilities to develop and submit an emergency safety plan. He added that the PG&E battery facility that shares the Moss Landing site has yet to file their plan.
San Jose State University’s Moss Landing Marine Laboratories was the first to announce their screening test of the wetland soils along Elkhorn Slough that run next to the plant. Their samples revealed the presence of elevated metals associated with lithium batteries. But in Wednesday’s briefing, Cynthia Vodopivec, senior vice president of environmental health and safety for Vistra, said she had not read the study. Neither had Ric Encarnacion, director of the Monterey County Environmental Health Department director.
“We made about six or seven requests,” said Pasculli from the county. “We never received it in its totality. We have received something, but I think we’re prohibited from doing anything with it until a peer review is done, so it can’t be released. They kind of put the cart before the horse.”
“The soil data is true data that California Department of Toxic Substance Control made those determinations on,” said Vodopivec, referring to the San Jose State data as just a guide to show where testing was needed. “We have not seen the data from San Jose, so we can’t really opine on that.”
In another screening, volunteers in the community group Never Again Moss Landing gathered 124 swipe samples within a 20-mile radius of the facility. Their results were validated by a professional laboratory and revealed elevated levels of nickel, manganese and cobalt in areas closer to the facility. Those are all materials present in lithium batteries.
On Wednesday, Dylan Clark, senior environmental specialist with DTSC, said the state soil test was more reliable and showed the presence of metals were below any risk to public health.
“The soil samples show that there’s no high levels of some of these metals in the soil,” said Monterey County Agricultural Commissioner Juan Hidalgo. “I think that’s a good step moving forward to ensure that our growers can continue to produce a safe food supply.”
Testing for contamination
The fire happened when a lot of the surrounding croplands were dormant for winter. Hidalgo considers the DTSC test to be an all-clear for growers and workers to start spring production.
Meanwhile, thousands of area residents on social media have reported having symptoms in the weeks following the fire, as well as trouble breathing, throat and eye irritation and strange rashes. Many of them report that their doctors don’t have the right tests for determining if they’ve been suffering from contamination.
“We do acknowledge that there may be some providers who this may be the first opportunity they have had to see a patient with these types of symptoms,” said Kristy Michie, the county’s assistant director of public health. “Public Health is developing a community survey to systematically gather information on symptoms residents may have experienced. We recognize that many community members may be reluctant to provide personal information to Public Health, which is part of the government agency.”
“What we experienced in this existing facility is not something that you’ll see into the future because this type of facility is not going to be rebuilt in the way that it was structured,” said County Administrative Officer Sonia De La Rosa. “Technology has changed significantly.”
Speaking by phone after the Wednesday meeting, Bernadette Del Chiaro of the California Solar & Storage Association explained that the type of lithium batteries that have been approved for home use is different than the type of battery that was likely in Moss Landing.
“If you were to take the cover off of that metal box at home, you would see little battery cells totally encased in fireproof barriers,” Del Chiaro said. “Residential lithium batteries are designed to not let the fire spread outside of the one little battery cell that does overheat.”
She said residential battery manufacturers proactively worked to make those batteries an industry standard, which was put into effect in California in 2019.
“That standard was later adopted for the utility scale batteries, but did not go into effect until 2021,” she said. “I have confirmed through my industry members that Vistra Moss Landing was one project that was not built to this standard, therefore it didn’t have any firewall. It had no barriers.”
At the Wednesday briefing, Craig Spencer, director of the county’s Housing and Community Development Department, said the facility was permitted in two phases.
“What burned was the first phase. Things were different in the second phase,” Spencer said. “There’s a number of efforts underway with state legislators and local regulators, California planning directors, to identify better management practices, rules and regulations around this, and updates to California building code. It’s a little bit behind the technology, but it’s definitely moving forward. We hope that true cooperation will ensure that before we do anything more that might put the public at risk.”