Researchers from San José State’s marine biology program are preparing to increase their efforts to research the effects of heavy metals in the local ecosystems after the Moss Landing fire.
On Jan. 16, a battery plant in Moss Landing, Calif. caught fire at around 3:00 p.m., according to a webpage from Monterey County. By 8:00 p.m., the county opened shelters and sent community members notices to inform them that schools in the area would be closed.
The fire continued to burn for multiple days, forcing local residents to evacuate, according to a press release from San José State.
There were also multiple road closures and air quality concerns during the first, according to the same press release. By Jan. 19, the road closures on U.S. Highway 1 were lifted.
Brad Watson, the director of Community Affairs for Vistra Energy, said company employees were on site at 11:30 p.m. on Wednesday.
“There are still some battery racks that are intact, and those have some state of charge in them,” Watson said. “Fortunately, there was no flare-ups, there was no reaction, no emissions and we took some drones up earlier today at daylight and we didn't see any problems developing.”
Watson also said the temperature in the building and around the batteries continued to decrease.
Ric Encarnacion, the director of Environmental Health in Monterey County, said his department is partnering with staff from multiple departments, including toxicologists to help the county do more research on the environmental impacts of the fire.
SJSU announced on Thursday that Ivano Aiello, a geological oceanographer and a department chair for the College of Science, measured an increase in heavy metals in marsh soil two miles away from the battery plant, according to the same press release.
The three heavy metals that were recorded were nickel,manganese and cobalt, according to the same press release from SJSU.
“Fires out (its) still being monitored for safety, and there's no continuous deposition that you would encounter like with factories or other businesses that may have constant emissions,” Encarnacion said. “In the aftermath of the fire, (what) we're trying to do is (trying) to determine what we can't visually see.”
Moss Landing Marine Laboratories holds SJSU’s marine science program and focuses on research to gain a better understanding of marine life and to help solve environmental issues caused by humans, according to its webpage.
Aiello said his particular focus is on doing research on the nearby marshlands in Elkhorn Slough as he’s been trying to restore the marshes for several years.
“It's beautiful, so it's one of the few wetlands that are still preserved in the area,” Aiello said. “There are very few locations that are left pristine; it's an invaluable resource.”
Elkhorn Slough is a wildlife sanctuary that provides a habitat for diverse populations of birds, plants, fish and marine animals, including sea otters and seals, according to its webpage.
Aiello said the ecosystems in the marshlands are very unique and delicate, have overlapping food chains between land and marine mammals and act as a buffer for urban areas when sea levels rise.
“If you have a marshland that borders an urban area (it) helps relatively to slow down sea level rise,” Aiello said.
He is analyzing marsh soil properties as part of a decade-long monitoring program at the sanctuary, according to the initial press release on the fire from SJSU.
Aiello said his main goal now is to track how the heavy metals will travel throughout the rest of the ecosystem.
“We want to see the effects of tides, whether when (there is a) very high tide (or) whether those tides are picking up those particles,” he said.
Samples from the lab show there is a heavy metal layer in the soil, according to SJSU’s press release. These metals are used to produce lithium batteries and are highly likely to be connected to the fire at Vistra’s battery plant.
Aiello said he also formed a team on Tuesday with four other faculty members at the laboratory to help him continue his research.
He said the other researchers will help do research into how the heavy metals in the soil could affect the rest of the ecosystem and the rest of the food chain.
A build-up of heavy metals in the ecosystem often results in soil or water degradation, resulting in an unbalanced ecosystem, according to a journal article from the Manipal Academy of Higher Education in Manipal, India.
These toxins can enter food chains through polluted soil, water and air leading to food contamination, according to the same source.
In response to President Donald J. Trump’s workforce executive orders, the National Science Foundation is planning to lay off around a quarter and a half of its staff in the next two months, according to a Tuesday article from Politico.
The National Science Foundation is the United States’ leading group for collecting funds for science and engineering research, according to the same source.
Aiello said the wetlands in the marshes are both important to the ecosystem in Elkhorn Slough sanctuary, but they are also tourist attractions for local community members and visitors.
“We use them because they are beautiful,” Aiello said. “They are a valuable resource to California.”
Nicholas M. Pasculli, Monterey County’s communications director and chief public information officer, said tourism is the county’s second-largest industry.
Around 4.6 million tourists visit Monterey County every year, while 435,232 residents live in the area year-round, according to a fact sheet from See Monterey.
“Anytime there's a disaster – regardless of if it's a flood or a fire, wildfire, any type of natural or man-made disaster – there's always economic impacts, and we're conscious of that,” Pasculli said.
Encarnacion said Monterey County’s Environmental Health Bureau will continue to play a large part in ensuring emergencies do not affect tourism or the economic viability of the community.
Tourism in Monterey County raises money for taxes and revenue from local attractions, including hotels and restaurants, according to another webpage from See Monterey. This money helps fund the county’s schools, roadways, police force and other infrastructure improvements.
“I want the public to be rest assured, we’re not going away,” Encarnacion said. “We are a standard service for the county. You may not hear about us every day, (but) when the time comes for us to respond, we're always there.”
Watson, the director of Community Affairs for Vistra Energy, said Vistra has two programs to help the local community recover from the impacts of the fire, the Business Claims Process and the Moss Landing Fire Relief Fund.
The Business Claims Process is a program run by a third-party claims administrator that will help businesses that were located in the evacuation zone or located at the Moss Landing Harbor, according to a webpage from Vistra.
Some of the costs that will be covered by the company include lost revenue and wages between Jan. 17 and Jan. 22, clean-up costs that were recorded after Jan. 16 and costs to make up for food spoilage for local restaurants, according to Vistra.
The Moss Landing Fire Relief Fund is a partnership between Vistra and the Community Foundation for Monterey County, according to a webpage from the foundation.
The fund will support households impacted by the fire, according to the same source.
Vistra has contributed more than $450,000 to establish a relief fund to offset expenses residents had to pay as a result of the 24-hour evacuation on Jan. 16, according to the foundation’s webpage.
Pasculli said the investigation into what caused the fire is still ongoing, but Monterey County is currently collecting and trying to preserve evidence from the site that could provide clues to what happened on Jan. 16.
“Everything will be looked at from top to bottom,” Pasculli said.
