California’s move toward zero-carbon energy includes encouraging municipalities to go above and beyond state regulations with “reach codes.” Goleta’s Reach Code, which goes to City Council on February 18 for a second reading, encourages electrification in new construction — while still allowing natural gas — by giving credits for items like solar arrays and battery storage systems when projects are under review. At Tuesday’s meeting, the council also seeks residents’ priorities on the city’s to-do list of costly improvement projects, affecting roads, creeks, trash, and pickleball.
Batteries in large storage systems are made of lithium-ion mixtures, which have the disturbing quality of being impossible to extinguish once they catch fire. This happened most recently at Moss Landing in Monterey County, when what was called one of the world’s largest battery storage facilities flamed up and burned for four days. How do we know that won’t happen here, asked Tom Modugno, whose GoletaHistory.com website features the city’s people, places, and disasters.
Modugno is referencing the the BESS, Goleta’s 60-megawatt battery energy storage system, which came online in December 2023, after the closure of a natural-gas-powered plant that provided energy needs during peak periods. “So, they traded a fossil fuel technology for a brand new technology that may or may not be safe,” Modugno said.
The 300-megawatt Moss Landing facility burned for days after the batteries heated into flames, sending a plume of smoke and heavy metals for miles. The batteries, made of a mixture of nickel manganese cobalt, were inside a building that once held turbines to generate electricity. Those conditions are very different compared to the Goleta battery site, said Jason Burwen, a vice president with GridStor, which built and operates the facility.
“The Goleta facility is an outdoor system with batteries in individual enclosures, which are field tested and designed with materials to ensure any fire incident does not propagate from enclosure to enclosure. That is why outdoor systems are the industry standard today,” Burwen said.
As large-scale battery installations grew, so have the rules. The Moss Landing facility was finished in 2020, before California began implementing the 2018 International Fire Code (IFC). Standards since then have required testing and measures to reduce the risk of a runaway fire, Burwen said: “The Goleta facility … was subject to … the most recent 2021 IFC, the 2023 edition of National Fire Protection Association (NFPA) 855 standard, and the 2021 edition of UL 9540 standard.”
As well, the Goleta site is inspected regularly and monitored remotely through more than 6,000 data points, Burwen said. An atypical measurement puts the system into safe mode: “If any cell temperature gets above the typical operating temperature, the system sends a warning and then shuts the system off.”
The chemistry in the Tesla Megapack 2 batteries at Goleta’s BESS are an improvement over Moss Landing’s. The older batteries contain cobalt, which bonds more weakly to oxygen molecules than the new lithium iron phosphate mixture. Not only does the new chemistry reduce the use of cobalt — a majority of the mineral is mined under slave-like conditions in the Congo — but iron phosphate resists the runaway phenomenon, as it takes a higher temperature for the oxygen molecules to be released.
Fred Tan, the fire marshal for Santa Barbara County Fire, said the new chemistry in today’s batteries can withstand twice the amount of heat of the old batteries. When GridStor installed its facility, Tan said, the company trained firefighters on response over multiple days. “They showed us the batteries and cases, where to shut things off, described what a fire would look like,” he recounted. Of any fire that should break out, he acknowledged that firefighters would have to let it run its course. “But each bank is separate from the others,” he emphasized, giving the fire crew the ability to ensure the other banks didn’t overheat.
Goleta’s BESS resides on Cortona Drive through a conditional use permit, and before its approval in October 2021, the project underwent hazard and risk assessment studies, safety studies, and environmental review, Planning Director Peter Imhof wrote in an email. He listed the many fire codes — both state and international — the facility must adhere to, as well as Underwriter Laboratory rules, tests, and standards that underpin the battery manufacture and chemistry. UL 1973, for example, “evaluates the battery system’s ability to safely withstand simulated abuse conditions. This standard evaluates the system based upon the manufacturer’s specified charge and discharge parameters. It requires that an Energy Storage System (ESS) is not allowed to create an explosion hazard when exposed to an external fire source and that a single cell failure will not result in a cascading thermal runaway of cells.”
With regard to a plume of smoke from a fire in a battery unit, Imhoff replied that all safety measures would be in effect regardless of the wind direction: “It is not possible to predict with any certainty the direction any smoke plume may drift, given changing seasonal and daily climate factors.”
Similarly, any battery storage units added to a new construction project under a Reach Code would be up to the builders, Imhoff said, but be subject to the same set of rules as larger banks of batteries. One stand-alone project of 30 batteries has been proposed on Viajero Drive, next to the unused peaker plant. “The project would require not only a [general plan amendment] and rezone, but also discretionary permit approvals, including a Development Plan and Conditional Use Permit with full CEQA environmental review,” Imhof explained.
Does any of that set Tom Modugno’s mind at rest? Modugno replied that his intent was to raise awareness, especially given the unknowns with an apartment complex right next door. “I accomplished my goal, and that was to shine a light on the facility,” he said.
Goleta’s hearing on the new Reach standards takes place during the regularly scheduled City Council meeting, which starts at 5:30 p.m. on Tuesday, February 18. Also up for discussion will be the city’s list of Capital Improvement Projects and its Strategic Plan, to include future goals and spending, with an opportunity for the community to give feedback.
