Unextinguishable fire. Nickel, manganese, and cobalt in the air. Tremors, tight lungs, and itchy skin. These are a few of the results that have emerged after the recent Moss Landing battery plant fire in Monterey County.
With the fire heightening concerns about a proposed battery energy storage system in Morro Bay and an already completed one in Nipomo, 4th District San Luis Obispo County Supervisor Jimmy Paulding said battery facilities have had different safety requirements since the construction of the plant in Moss Landing, and the Nipomo facility is much safer.
“It’s my understanding that all the tests performed to date have been compliant with current codes,” Paulding told New Times.
On Jan. 16, the Vistra-owned Moss Landing battery facility caught fire for the third time since 2021, shutting down Highway 1 and causing mandatory evacuations in the area. The 750-megawatt facility was ablaze for three days.
Weeks later, research scientists at San Jose State University’s Moss Landing Marine Laboratories reported detecting unusually high levels of heavy metal nanoparticles in the marsh soils of Elkhorn Slough Reserve, a site that provides habitat for nearly 700 species.
According to the lab, scientists found high levels of nickel, manganese, and cobalt in the marsh soils.
“These heavy metals will chemically transform as they move through the environments and potentially through the food web, affecting local aquatic and terrestrial ecosystems,” according to a statement from the lab.
Monterey County residents are feeling the effects as well and created Facebook pages where they can share their post-fire symptoms, including labored breathing, a tight stomach, hand tremors, itchy skin—all side effects of heavy metal exposure, according to the National Institutes of Health.
These are impacts that the residents of Morro Bay and Nipomo don’t want to experience.
Morro Bay weighed in on the proposed 600-megawatt Vistra battery plant with residents passing a ballot measure to block the build and the City Council establishing an urgency ordinance in to block future battery plant applications. But the 100-megawatt Caballero battery facility in Nipomo owned by Alpha Omega Power and Fengate flew under the radar, according to public commenters at a Feb. 4 SLO County Board of Supervisors meeting.
Decades-long Nipomo resident Sherry Fitzgerald told the board she felt the community hadn’t even known about the Caballero battery plant, which was processed in 2020, approved in 2023, and completed this February. If they did, she said they would have opposed it considering what happened with Moss Landing.
Another resident told supervisors she had heard that the Nipomo facility was “way better” than Moss Landing.
“I’m not buying that,” she said.
The most recent Moss Landing fire started after the facility’s safety and fire suppression systems failed. With the facility’s batteries all together in the same enclosure, the fire spread easily and quickly.
Supervisor Paulding said technology has progressed since the Moss Landing facility was built, and that the Caballero facility has better safety measures with its batteries in separate enclosures that are 10 feet apart to prevent fire from spreading.
“The batteries in this project had to undergo rigorous testing to ensure their safety,” Paulding told New Times, explaining that the batteries were heated up to see if they would catch on fire. The batteries did not catch fire, he said.
CTO and co-founder of Alpha Omega Power Guillaume Dufay told New Times via email that the Caballero facility meets all safety standards that make a catastrophic event “near impossible,” including early fire detection and automatic shut-off systems.
“Caballero meets [code] requirements and goes beyond in many areas that our team and Cal Fire found important for public safety,” he said.
As of Feb. 12, Monterey County officials told residents at a press conference that there was no need to worry about lingering environmental hazards, despite the results of San Jose State’s findings.
Monterey County Environmental Health Bureau Chief Ric Encarnacion said that while fire ash and debris did show elevated metals, initial soil testing reports within a 4-miles radius from the fire did not show any.
“Regarding drinking water, our test samples remain within regulatory standards, and the results are consistent with historical data,” he said.
Air quality was also in the clear, according to Air Pollution Control Officer Richard Stedman of the Monterey Bay Air Resources District, who said that the county’s nearby air monitors did not reveal any heavy metals in the air related to the Moss Landing fire.
“We continue to see good air quality around the facility,” Stedman said.
Testing for heavy metal contamination is ongoing. Δ
Reach Staff Writer Libbey Hanson at lhanson@newtimesslo.com.
This article appears in Feb 20 – Mar 2, 2025.
You know what? Jimmy Paulding has never once apologized to the Nipomo community for at a minimum a complete gaffe in communications. I heard him try to blame staff in the BOS meeting (about noticing distances), but he has NEVER owned any responsibility. We are humans, we screw up. The only grown-up way to move forward is to pick ourselves up, apologize for our failure, and determine a plan to move forward in a better way. I sense time for change in the 4th district.
I am a strong supporter of Jimmy Paulding. But he is quoted as saying there is 10 feet of separation between battery enclosures at Caballero BESS in Nipomo. However the photo shows clearly the spacing is less than 10 feet (note cars for scale) and Vistra’s own plan in environmental documents with the County indicates the spacing will be 6 feet (see: 10164224 – ORIGIS CABALLERO-E200 SITE PLAN document at: https://sanluisobispocountyca-energovweb.tylerhost.net/apps/selfservice#/plan/920008fc-4b46-4e6a-beb2-b80d7b50d141?tab=attachments ).
Jimmy also says the Caballero facility was constructed according to code, in order to reassure us. This is a CYA exercise. Wasn’t Vistra’s Moss Landing facility also constructed to code at the time? Result was 3 fires at the facility since 2021. We need to know if the codes provide adequate protection to residents and the environment, and if they need to be revised.