Hundreds of people were ordered to evacuate and a section of Highway 1 in Northern California was closed when a massive fire broke out at one of the world's largest battery storage plants on Thursday afternoon.
The Moss Landing power plant, located about 77 miles south of San Francisco, is owned by Texas-based Vistra Energy and contains tens of thousands of lithium batteries. These batteries are important for storing electricity from renewable sources like solar power, but if they catch fire, extinguishing the fire can be extremely difficult.
"There's no way to make this look good. This is a disaster, it is what it is," Monterey County Supervisor Glen Church told KSBW-TV, according to the AP.
However, he added that he does not expect the fire to spread outside the concrete building in which it is confined.
The fires occurred at the Vistra factory in both 2021 and 2022, and were caused by a fire protection system failure that led to some units overheating, according to a report by The Mercury News.
It is unclear what caused the latest fire. Vistra said in a statement that everyone at the site was evacuated to safety after the fire was detected. An investigation will begin once the fire is extinguished.
"Our top priority is the safety of the community and our staff, and Vistra deeply appreciates the continued assistance of local emergency services," said Jenny Lyon, a Vistra spokeswoman, in a statement, NBC reported.
The North Monterey Unified School District announced that all schools and offices will be closed due to the fire.
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