EPA delivers Moss Landing battery fire research numbers to Monterey County
Ata Shaheen
MOSS LANDING, Calif. (KION-TV) – Representatives from the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) here in Salinas gave an update on clean-up efforts and current conditions at the Moss Landing Battery Energy Storage Facility.
The building went up in flames at the beginning of the year.
It has now been two months since the U.S. EPA tasked Vistra Energy with cleaning up and removing the batteries and debris, and footing the bill. It will take them more than a year to actually get the batteries out.
Vistra has private firefighters on site and is continuing to monitor and sample air quality. The EPA said they’re focused on transparency and communication.
“No community needs or wants an incident like this. Nor does Vistra who was trying to be a community partner in this as well,” said Lynn Keller, supervisory environmental engineer at U.S. EPA. “So, we’re all trying to work together to do the right thing and get this issue addressed in a way that is transparent to the community and gets these potentially dangerous, partially burned batteries out of your community.”
The EPA stated they’re taking extreme precautions to ensure another issue does not arise during the cleanup.
A county website that displays testing results for hydrogen fluoride and other toxic chemicals near the site shows the limit to be below the health risk threshold in both the immediate and surrounding areas.
Vistra also said there’s no time frame for a decision about whether to start operating again at the facility
The question of where the batteries will be disposed of was answered as they will be sent to a special site near Reno, Nevada.
A demolition contractor is working on stabilizing the facility to make it safe for the removal to begin.
The building will be demolished in phases between this year and the end of next.