A massive battery power plant is on fire in California

A fire broke out Thursday at the Moss Landing Energy Storage Facility in central California. The battery power plant is the world's largest, according to Vistra, the company that owns it.

The Monterey County Sheriff's Office issued evacuation orders for nearby residents and closed parts of Highway 1. County health officials have asked other residents to stay indoors with windows and doors closed and turn off ventilation systems.

Monterey County Supervisor Glenn Church told KSBW-TV, "There's no way to deal with this. It's a disaster, that's what it is."

Vistra spokeswoman Jenny Lyons told The Mercury News after the fire was extinguished that the company would investigate the cause of the fire. Vistra did not immediately respond to an email sent to The Verge. It completed an expansion of the facility in 2023, adding more than 110,000 battery modules needed to store renewable energy. Energy storage facilities like these are essential for power grids to retain enough excess solar and wind power so it's available when the sun goes down and the winds subside.

This is not the first battery fire in the region. A nearby Pacific Gas & Electric battery plant filled with Tesla batteries caught fire in 2022. A year ago, Vistra had to temporarily shut down its battery plant in Moss Landing after a malfunctioning smoke detector and heat-suppression system caused water to spill onto batteries, Canary Media reported.

The current fire is not related to the fires burning to the south that have devastated Los Angeles County.