MOSS LANDING, Calif. — A fire is raging at the Vistra Energy battery storage plant in Moss Landing, one of the largest such facilities in the world. The blaze, which erupted late Thursday afternoon, has sent plumes of hazardous black smoke into the air, prompting evacuations, road closures, and a significant emergency response effort.
The fire broke out around 3 p.m. at the plant located on Highway 1 in Monterey County, officials report. Flames and smoke continue to emanate from the facility, which houses thousands of lithium batteries designed to store electricity generated during the day for use at night. The cause of the fire remains unknown.
Evacuation orders are in effect for areas south of Elkhorn Slough, north of Molera Road and Monterey Dunes Way, and west of Castroville Boulevard. Approximately 1,500 residents have been displaced. The Castroville Recreation Center at 11261 Crane Street is serving as a temporary evacuation center.
Highway 1 is closed in both directions between Highway 183 and Struve Road. Officials have not provided an estimated reopening time.
Monterey County spokesperson Nicholas Pasculli:
“It’s imperative that residents heed the evacuation order and take the direction of law enforcement and fire personnel,” Pasculli said. “This is a situation where we take the idea of protecting life and property very seriously. We implore people to heed the evacuation order and to go to a safe location.”
https://www.mercurynews.com/2025/01/16/moss-landing-power-plant-fire-evacuations-road-closures/
The plant, operated by Texas-based Vistra Energy, is a cornerstone of California’s clean energy strategy. Its massive capacity to store renewable energy is integral to the state’s transition to green power. The facility was expanded in 2023 to hold 750 megawatts of electricity, enough to power thousands of homes.
Lithium battery fires are notoriously difficult to extinguish due to the high temperatures and toxic gases they emit, which pose risks to respiratory health, skin, and eyes. All staff were safely evacuated, and emergency teams are working to contain the blaze within the plant’s concrete structure. Officials have stated that while the fire is extensive, it is “contained” to the building.
This is not the first fire at the Moss Landing site. Previous incidents in 2021 and 2022 were attributed to sprinkler malfunctions and system flaws, causing heightened scrutiny of battery storage safety. These incidents prompted California Governor Gavin Newsom to require battery plants to develop emergency response plans with local fire departments.
As authorities investigate this latest incident, concerns are rising over the safety of such facilities and their proximity to populated areas. This is a developing story, with updates expected as more information becomes available.
H//T JWG, doonman,
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BEWARE! Plants like this are coming to a location near you all over the world. Fire fighter employment
opportunities are going to sky rocket.
Lithium battery fires are the best fires for firefighters to fight. Much like having no water in the fire hydrants, they just standby and wait until they burn out. Sorry about your luck, they get paid either way.
Ah, the millions of well paying green energy jobs! Now we know what they are.
Depends on who is in charge of the fire department.
There’s a battery plant under construction a few blocks from where I work. The good news is that the plant is supposed to use LFP batteries and not Li-ion batteries (bigoilbob’s question was very appropriate). The plant is also located at the crest of a slope covered with chaparral.
LFPs can still catch fire:
https://www.pv-magazine.com/2021/04/21/two-firefighters-killed-and-one-missing-after-beijing-battery-blaze/
But it’s a green toxin.
Look, lithium battery fires are rare, OK? They must be, I hear that at least 15 times a day.
lithium battery fires are rare
I hear that a lot too. Every time there’s a lithium battery fire…
Which is to say 15 times a day.
Why did the Moss Landing gas power plant get closed and demolished? Replaced by a $400 million battery farm on the same property storing excess solar energy? It would have been smarter to build a new natural gas power plant that would last over 40 years versus solar panels and batteries maybe good for 20 years, at most. If no fires! This makes no financial sense, unless there were big subsidies.
The Moss Landing gas power plant began commercial operation in 1950.
Original owner: Pacific Gas & Electric. Major upgrade: New combined cycle units were added in 2002, making it the largest power plant in California at the time. It did not have to be demolished in 2023.
The Moss Landing Energy Storage Facility in California has a total capacity of 3,000 megawatt-hours (MWh). This makes it the world’s largest battery energy storage system of its kind.
The Moss Landing Power Plant in California, owned by Vistra Energy, generates electricity using natural gas. The plant is located in Monterey County, California, near Moss Landing Harbor.
The Moss Landing Power Plant is a natural gas-fired, combined cycle facility that has been providing electricity to California since 1950.
The plant’s large stacks are visible throughout the Monterey Bay Area.
Vistra also owns the Moss Landing Energy Storage Facility, which is located on the same site as the power plant. The facility uses batteries to store excess electricity from the grid and release it when demand is high.
Vistra is one of the largest electricity providers in the United States and offers a variety of energy sources, including natural gas, solar, nuclear, and battery energy storage.
“These incidents prompted California Governor Gavin Newsom to require battery plants to develop emergency response plans with local fire departments.”
That sounds strange to me. For decades we had drills with the first responders (Fire Dept.) at the large water water plant plant I worked at. (Primarily in the event of a large hazardous chemical release.)
Newsom’s California is just doing this now?!?
The emergency response plan is to let the lithium fires burn themselves out and confuse people by issuing “shelter in place” and “evacuate immediately” orders simultaneously. Then hold a press conference explaining that didn’t happen and proclaiming that “we need to do better”.
We NEED MORE BRAINS….
ref. Return of the Walking Dead….
Maybe Newsom will issue an executive order that everyone living within a 10 mile radius of such battery storage facilities must own an RV?
That way they can “shelter in place” at the same time they “evacuate immediately”!
750 megawatts – enough to power thousands of homes. For how long?
4 hours.
Well I suggest that they utilize every possible MWH from the next Lithium Ion plant that they build by including a steam turbine for end of life energy capture.
Thank you Moss Landing for your great contribution for us California electric rate payers. Your timely fire should now make it impossible to ensure future grid scale battery storage and we can end the stupidity sooner instead of later. Wonderful news!.
impossible to buy future grid scale battery storage, not “ensure”:(did I do that or autocheck? Whatever.
Utilities typically buy insurance for their battery storage systems rather than self-insure. This specialized insurance, known as Battery Energy Storage System (BESS) insurance, covers a range of risks including equipment damage, fire, theft, system failures, and third-party liabilities for personal injury or property damage.
The beatings will continue until moral improves.
The insanity will continue until sufficient damage is inflicted.
All journeys begin with the first step.
Can we hope this is the first step on the journey back to sanity?
Grid scale storage? 3GWh? Is this a joke? What grid is that? If California’s grid uses 300TWh pa that’s 820GWh per day. 3GWh is 3/820 of a day’s energy demand, which is 5 minutes. Some mistake, surely? Did I get something wrong? If so, better numbers on a postcard please…. MIEE
As of Oct 2024 CA had about 13GW of grid scale battery storage. This is about 25% of their 2045 target. Their propaganda does not specify MWh.
I doubt those face masks are going to protect people from toxic smoke.
This is not good news, if California would only go back to fossil fuel and nuclear generation stuff like this wouldn’t happen. California is putting its citizens in danger for no good reason. It is criminal.
All one party fascist states are criminal. It’s a feature of fascism.
This was not a fire
It was a high temperature event
Next week will not be damn cold
It will be a polar vortex weather anomaly
Those EV fires are not battery fires
They are accidents caused by misuse of the tailgate BBQ option, commonly purchased by EV owners.
These are all Big Oil propaganda claims from people who want to destroy our planet and move to Uranus because it has 28 moons.
All of these events are bad news, so they must all be caused by climate change. Climate change will kill your dog. Climate deniers must hate dogs.
Just thought that read 28 Morons. Which fitted the target demographic green emigrants classification rather well. Douglas Adams covered just such an emigration from Earth by the top people in the Golgafrinchan B Ark in which they placed the lucky management consultants, hairdressers, telephone sanitisers, politicians, HR management – the first to be saved from the impending Earth disaster, sent into space to seek put a new planet to save humanity.
They A and C Arks did nor follow, however….. Now we would add the green activists.
Vistra Energy info from Marketbeat https://www.marketbeat.com/stocks/NYSE/VST/institutional-ownership/
Not a good year, so far, for the Climate Cartel.
I can’t tell if the batteries were themselves supplied by one of Elon Musk’s outfits,
Oops, it’s off to the races again. The fires at Moss Landing Battery storage have restarted this afternoon. It’s now burning more than yesterday.
Was anybody really surprised?
That would be because they were not burnt out yet. They are sel fuelling so won’t stop until all the battery contents have burnt. The fire is self contained as regards all ts constituent parts. NO air required.
“Its massive capacity to store renewable energy is integral to the state’s transition to green power. “
Clouseau: “Not any more.”
EV and Powerwall type batteries in LA can keep on keeping on-
Tesla Batteries Burning in LA Wildfire Present an Irony About Sustainability
Meanwhile on the busses-
Another Lion Electric Bus Fire: Huntsville, Ontario
Crews put out electric bus fire in Grants Pass | Top Stories | kdrv.com
Are they going to incinerate a bus load of school kiddies before they wake up to the danger? Or will the insurance underwriters kill the busses off first?
Finally a fire not at a nuclear power plant!
Just as a matter of interest, I note that this facility was supposedly able to provide 750 megawatts of power for thousands of homes. My question is, for how long can the battery provide that power? 750Mw alone is a useless statement.
And I am very happy I live nowhere near it.