A state lawmaker and a Monterey County supervisor are calling for the Vistra Moss Landing Energy Storage Facility to remain closed until an independent investigation can determine the cause of last week’s fire.
The fire was still burning itself out Monday.
District 2 Supervisor Glenn Church said in a statement he has deep concerns about the effects of fire on nearby residents’ health and on the environment. Church said that both he and State Assemblymember Dawn Addis want the facility to stay offline until safety measures are implemented to prevent another fire.
“In all honesty, I do not know if those guarantees are possible,” Church said. “With this being the fourth fire incident in a little over five years in Moss Landing, it is obvious that this technology is ahead of both government’s ability to regulate it and private industry’s ability to control it.”
Lithium-ion batteries at the facility caught fire Thursday. Evacuation orders for about 1,200 people were lifted Friday evening. Nearby state Highway 1 remained closed in both directions at the plant until Sunday evening.
PG&E also has its own battery storage facility at the site that is still online. There was a fire at the site — an area shared by Tesla — in 2022.
Lack of a ‘proven system’ to fight battery fires
Church said he wants more fire prevention put in place. After speaking with local fire officials, the supervisor said it is clear to him there’s no proven way to just extinguish a battery fire once it’s reached the magnitude of the Vistra blaze.
“Attempts to put out battery fires at other sites have only worsened the situation,” Church said. “Water is used initially only when the batteries start to heat, not when flames have emerged. I find the lack of a proven system to extinguish the fires highly alarming. We simply cannot have a fire incident every year or two and expect that to be normal.”
Monterey County said Monday air monitors near the facility hadn’t detected dangerous levels of hydrogen fluoride (HF).
Specifically, officials said the levels haven’t exceeded California Office of Environmental Health Hazard Assessment’s (OEHHA’s) acute Reference Exposure Level (REL).
An acute REL is the highest concentration of a chemical in the air to which a person can be exposed for an hour without increasing their risk of experiencing serious, non-cancer health impacts.
“I find the lack of a proven system to extinguish the fires highly alarming. We simply cannot have a fire incident every year or two and expect that to be normal.”
Monterey County Supervisor Glenn Church
Monterey County said concentrations of small particulate matter (PM 2.5) have been measured at levels categorized by MBARD as “good” to “moderate.”
Monitoring air quality
The U.S. Environmental Protection Agency (EPA), Vistra’s independent contractor CTEH, and the Monterey Bay Air Resources District (MBARD) are monitoring air for particulate matter (PM) and chemicals both within the battery facility and throughout the region.
Monitoring locations and results are being posted publicly as information becomes available on the MBARD webpage and the County of Monterey Department of Emergency Management incident page.
Attorneys representing community members participated in a virtual town hall meeting on Monday afternoon to give community updates and discuss available resources.
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