Locals request total shutdown of Moss Landing as California Governor calls for investigation into battery storage fire
Courtesy: Cullan Smith via Unsplash
California Governor Gavin Newsom is calling for an investigation into the fire that engulfed the first phase of Vistra Energy’s Moss Landing Energy Storage Facility last week.
A spokesperson for Gov. Gavin Newsom said Vistra and the California Public Utilities Commission (CPUC) should conduct separate fact-finding missions to determine the cause of the fire and outline potential steps that can be taken to make similar facilities safer. The CPUC’s Safety and Enforcement Division is scheduled to meet with Vistra today.
Moss Landing, located about 77 miles south of San Francisco, houses tens of thousands of lithium batteries produced by LG Energy Solution Ltd. siloed in three separate concrete enclosures. Last Thursday at around 3 pm PT, a fire was reported in the 300-megawatt (MW) Phase I building. The property was promptly evacuated, and all employees and fire personnel have since been confirmed safe.
Smoke pours from a smoldering fire at Vistra Corp.’s Moss Landing battery storage facility in Moss Landing, California, US, on Friday, Jan. 17, 2025. A fire broke out at Vistra Corp.’s Moss Landing complex in California, one of the world’s biggest battery storage facilities,… pic.twitter.com/fSKXcdPXXa
— Jordan Caballero (@jordancaballero) January 19, 2025
Thousands of people were instructed to leave the area, several roads were shut down including Highway 1, and some schools and businesses had to close Friday as the plant continued to burn. The fire did not escape its enclosure and spread to other areas of the facility. It was mostly out by the weekend, although pockets continued to smolder days later, hampering Vistra’s ability to start an investigation.
Texas-based Vistra celebrated an expansion of the battery power plant in August 2023, which pushed its total capacity to 750 MW/3,000 MWh, making it the largest battery energy storage system (BESS) in the world at the time (now the second-largest).
Last week’s fire was the latest in a string of incidents at Moss Landing. In September 2021 a purported software programming error caused a heat suppression system to activate and douse three 100 MW racks of batteries. A second, nearly identical snafu involving the early detection safety system occurred in February 2022 in the 100 MW Phase II building next door.
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Pull the plug?
While the foundations of an investigation are laid, some concerned locals are making the request that companies operating the BESS on and adjacent to the Moss Landing site completely shut them down until officials can determine what sparked the blaze and how it may have been prevented.
The Monterey County Board of Supervisors voted 5-0 in an emergency meeting Tuesday to approve a local state emergency over the fire. The board is also asking Vistra to cease operations on the rest of the 750 MW facility and recommend utility Pacific Gas & Electric (PG&E) do the same at their nearby 182 MW Moss Landing Elkhorn Battery, which was not impacted by the fire at Vistra’s facility.
At the meeting, Monterey County Supervisor Glenn Church suggested lithium-based battery energy storage technology has evolved too quickly for the government to properly regulate it or for companies like Vistra to be able to safely utilise it.
“This process we are now in, which is learning as we go, just doesn’t work,” Church declared. “It jeopardizes communities.”
Other community members voiced worries over air pollution and its impact on nearby farmland. Current best practice dictates lithium battery fires be allowed to burn out on their own, which was the course of action for the Moss Landing fire.
“We all had a metallic taste in our mouth, burning eyes, burning throat, and yellow residue all over our things,” reported Michelle Clary, a resident of nearby Royal Oaks.
I wonder what percentage of the country depends on the crops currently getting toxic lithium fallout rained down upon them from the fire at Vistra Power Plant in Moss Landing, CA pic.twitter.com/TNKgGNXMJh
— Kevin Dalton (@TheKevinDalton) January 17, 2025
“I’m very skeptical that there’s zero contaminants in the material, in the building, or what may have settled on the ground and on the crops. We have people who have organic farmers who are concerned,” added Ed Mitchell of the Moss Landing Fire Community Recovery Group.
The Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) set up air monitors the night the fire started and has not yet seen indications of dangerous levels of particulate matter. At Tuesday’s meeting, the director of environmental health for Monterey County confirmed no amount of soot or hydrogen fluoride has been detected above state health guidelines.
“Air monitoring conducted by the Environmental Protection Agency and independent third-party air quality experts continues to demonstrate the site and surrounding area is safe and does not pose a risk for the public,” confirmed Vistra in a statement.
It is unknown how long the Moss Landing facility will be out of operation.
Originally published by Paul Gerke on Renewable Energy World.
