Technology

Tesla Megapack battery fire is ‘fully controlled,’ shelter-in-place advisory lifted

Illustration by Alex Castro / The Verge

A Tesla Megapack battery caught hearth this morning on the native utility firm PG&E’s Elkhorn Battery Storage facility in Monterey County, California, as reported by native information stations KSBW Motion Information 8 and KRON4.

The hearth began at round 1:30AM this morning, in keeping with PG&E’s operations comm supervisor, Jeff Smith. No accidents have been reported on the scene.

Round 7PM PT / 10PM ET, the North County Fireplace Division and Monterey County Sheriff’s Workplace lifted the advisory and reopened the roads. In a tweet from the Public Data for Monterey County account, officers reported on the Megapack battery hearth on the Elkhorn facility, saying, “Whereas the fireplace is taken into account absolutely managed, smoke should happen within the space for a number of days.”

Monterey County Sheriff’s Workplace, North County Fireplace Safety District, and Pacific Fuel & Electrical had issued a shelter-in-place advisory for close by areas, full with an interactive map exhibiting which areas are affected and highway closures that lasted greater than 12 hours. Residents have been requested to close all home windows and switch off air flow methods because of the hazardous waste materials incident attributable to the Tesla Megapack hearth.

Caltrans confirmed the fire closed a section of Highway 1 as hearth crews deployed models to deal with the blaze. The California Freeway Patrol tweeted at 4:29PM that the closure had been prolonged attributable to air high quality issues.

In accordance with Smith, built-in security methods labored as designed, routinely disconnecting the Tesla batteries from the grid when the fireplace was detected.

The Vistra Zero facility, long building at center, at the Moss Landing Power Plant with a similar Tesla facility behind it in Moss Landing, Calif., on Wednesday, January 13, 2021. Vistra Zero is the largest energy storage system of its kind in the world,
Picture By Carlos Avila Gonzalez/The San Francisco Chronicle through Getty Pictures
The Vistra Zero facility, lengthy constructing at heart, on the Moss Touchdown Energy Plant with an identical Tesla facility behind it.

The Elkhorn battery facility, positioned at Moss Touchdown, homes a 182.5-megawatt Tesla Megapack system initially introduced in 2019. The ability is owned and operated by PG&E, nevertheless it was designed, constructed, and can also be maintained by each Tesla and the utility firm. Smith mentioned PG&E doesn’t count on the fires to trigger clients any outages.

California’s electrical grid is linked to a number of battery storage amenities, together with Vistra Moss Touchdown Power Storage Facility, a 400-megawatt setup throughout two buildings adjoining to Elkhorn. The upper energy operation homes batteries constructed by LG Power Options, and in keeping with Mercury Information, it was shut down earlier this yr attributable to no less than two separate points with overheating batteries.

In July, Vistra restarted the amenities whereas working at 98 % of max capability “after implementing recognized corrective actions, together with associated to connectors within the water-based warmth suppression system.” It’s at the moment constructing a 350-MW Part III enlargement and talked about plans for a section 4 setup that may elevate the location’s capability to 1,500 MW.

Replace 4:55PM ET: Added shelter-in-place advisory discover from Monterey County officers, and extra native protection from KSBW Motion Information 8.

Replace 11:05PM ET: Up to date to notice advisory has been lifted, roads are reopened, and the fireplace is taken into account “absolutely managed.”

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