Major Fire at California Power Plant (world largest Lithium grid back up) Firefighters say best choice "Let it burn"

[MVAR]

Yeah, we are a LONG way from that unfortunately.

Of note, this is not the 2nd fire, as reported in the article, but actually the 3rd.

Phase I caught fire in September of 2021, Phase II caught fire in February of 2022, this is now Phase I catching fire again. Great track record.

Think I've mentioned this previously but I was involved with writing & processing the switching for the 115kV switchyard upgrade project for this station (It's a 500kV switchyard that has voltages down to sub transmission levels). In 2001-2003 I was also a part of the old Unit 1-5 demo, Unit 6-7 (supercritical 3600psig) refurb & the new 4 on 2 Units 1 & 2 construction.

The old station had a foam firefighting system separate from the deluge & cardox systems. The foam was no longer legal for sale in CA but use of old stock was allowed. The foam systems were for the MCC's and other high voltage suppression. These older systems would have been handy in this situation too bad foam=bad

 

[slo town]

That's a lot less obtrusive than those giant windmills they've put up everywhere on the east side of Washington.

I would agree with that. The windmills put up on the surrounding hills above Tehachipi in the last 5 years has ruined its mountain valley visual appeal. Passed through it many times, stopping for lunch a few times. Sue and I liked that town. We stayed there one night and had an outstanding beef dinner at a place I forget now. I remember both our meals being delicious.

Scott

 

[MVAR]

Getting back to previous part of the convo, I drove the E90 out to the California Valley area where the massive solar farms are. I've been making driving sorties out here before the solar farms came.

Anyway, a few pictures from today. Sunny and a warm 60 degrees, nobody on the road - like nooobody, and dry as a bone. This entire region of the state is dry, all the way to the coast too. Dead dry.

Scott

Pictures are about my driving tour because we were talking about it. I'm not trying to be controversial.

I love driving out there. Roads are fantastic for an afternoon sortie. Understand too, what you see here is probably 50 miles from the coast.

The is the "California Valley Solar Ranch". Their acreage is on the south east end of the valley.
View attachment 259484

This is looking west over what I presume are CVSR panels. The picture does a dismal job of capturing the scale of things. This is a very large are you see covered, and it's just one of a patchwork of many.
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This is looking south over I presume CVSR acreage. This picture is super cropped to zoom it in. What you see is a very, very large area.
View attachment 259486

Now I'm in the northwest area.
View attachment 259487

This are all panels of in the far distance. The viewpoint you see is many miles wide and far off into the distance.
View attachment 259488

They do a nice job of walling the panels off. The way they do it blends in pretty well I think. The wall goes on for miles and there are other walled off areas that are part of a larger patchwork of panels.
View attachment 259490

The "residential" part of California Valley. Out in the middle of nowhere.
View attachment 259491

Those CA Valley PV stations are what shuttered the Morro Bay PP early as the 230kV line congestion they created made the MBPP unusable. The MBPP used to be the main voltage control station for the "Diablo" or SLO area with its enormous reactive reserves.

 

[SammyChevelleTypeS3]

A small town refuge from the Silicon Valley machine...
I ain't going nowhere. They will take me outta Los Gatos in a box.

I see, you are living & loving it in the part of Cal where the founding members of the Doobie Brothers came from in late 60s. They pretty much paid their dues playing all around the Santa Cruz mountains. I am certain some will think..."the Doobie Whatties?" Not you though JK I am thinking.

 

[JeffKeryk]

I see, you are living & loving it in the part of Cal where the founding members of the Doobie Brothers came from in late 60s. They pretty much paid their dues playing all around the Santa Cruz mountains. I am certain some will think..."the Doobie Whatties?" Not you though JK I am thinking.

"Loma Prieta my moutain home..." I saw Tom Johnston at the Bodega in Campbell when he was kicked out of the Doobies for awhile.
He started the band while attending San Jose State along with Pat Simmons. Love them...

And yes, we live at the foot of the Santa Cruz Mountains. None of the streets around here are level. @slo town is from here; he knows the area and its history so well.

 

[Opelman]

Yeah, I'm trying to find a good way to leave her. It's not easy

Just do it. I am a 3rd generation native Californian, all from the LA harbor area. Almost 3 years ago I had an experience which made me give up totally on the state, within a month we were looking in Indiana. 4 months later the stars aligned when I retired and we found the absolute perfect place for us, sold at the market peak and got out. Call it provenance, fate, or divine intervention but we are incredibly happy and grateful to be in rural northern Indiana. One of my best friends of over 30 years who lived down the street in CA asked me "why Indiana?" He now lives in the southern part of Indiana. Get out of CA and you will quickly see that like the proverbial frog in the pot how bad things have been getting there incrementally. There is a whole country out there full of beauty, we just need to see it.

 

[Pablo]

I'm old enough to remember when natural gas was considered the "clean alternative" (and it wasn't that long ago). There used to be television commercials hailing the benefits of natural gas.

Scott

I think people need to wake up and know all energy gen has trade offs, natural gas with even partial CO2 capture remains viable.

On a financial forum a guy was against ALL HC burning, and against nukes, and hydro - ruled them out from on high. He said we could do everything with solar, wind and batteries. People told him batteries can be OK, but have some limitations, he would hear none of it. This was ~ 2 years ago. This is the problem as I see it. I don't rule out solar, batteries and wind.

Reasonable people don't rule out any source. They take an engineering and human and planet view and balance the factors.

California thinking is wrong. Period. Yet other states will follow.

 

[slo town]

And yes, we live at the foot of the Santa Cruz Mountains. None of the streets around here are level. @slo town is from here; he knows the area and its history so well.
View attachment 259502

Yep, I spent decades in Los Gatos. A beautiful little town. The now impossible to afford Victorian homes in the Glen Ridge area were once occupied by drug dealing bikers (the '60s), Pennsylvania Avenue in particular. And on the Shannon and Kennedy Road side of town I used to drive my girlfriends up there where we'd park and have a good time. I had my first bicycle crash as an adult (late 30s) on Kennedy Road. Because my body slid on the roadway the crash ripped my cycling clothes to shreds. My "bum" was fully exposed and bleeding badly from both cheeks because of wicked road rash. I remember several motorists slow as they passed me while I made my way home, asking me "Are you okay?! Do you need help?" Humans can be nice at times. I used to see famous Olympic Champion figure skater Peggy Fleming at Los Gatos Coffee Roasting on a regular basis. She had a powerful elegance to her. We said "hi" to each other one time while standing in line together. She always struck me as being "normal". One time I got a speeding ticket (radar) while blasting down Loma Alta Avenue on my way to work one morning - on my bicycle. Sue and I got married in Los Gatos on Shannon Road, just a short distance from where I used to park with my girlfriends! Haha. And out where @JeffKeryk now lives - that was the "outback" of Los Gatos in the old days. Not much was there. Lots of memories in LG. It will always have a special place in my heart.

But Templeton is where we live now and my affection for it is just as great as my affection for Los Gatos. I adore my little Central Coast town.

Scott

 

[Dave Hess]

I could move to California anytime I want. Even have a house. I left in 1986 for a reason and I am not going back.

What career field / job were you working in bad then ?

Just wondering, I know you were an engineer.

No need to answer if you don’t want to…

 

[Pablo]

What career field / job were you working in bad then ?

Just wondering, I know you were an engineer.

No need to answer if you don’t want to…

BACK then? Well there were ups and downs then, but electronics, hi-reliability - so anywhere there was a plant. Anaheim, Grants Pass, Bothell, Bellingham, Redmond are all towns I worked in. Mostly aerospace, telecom, high end products.

 

[OVERKILL]

Think I've mentioned this previously but I was involved with writing & processing the switching for the 115kV switchyard upgrade project for this station (It's a 500kV switchyard that has voltages down to sub transmission levels). In 2001-2003 I was also a part of the old Unit 1-5 demo, Unit 6-7 (supercritical 3600psig) refurb & the new 4 on 2 Units 1 & 2 construction.

The old station had a foam firefighting system separate from the deluge & cardox systems. The foam was no longer legal for sale in CA but use of old stock was allowed. The foam systems were for the MCC's and other high voltage suppression. These older systems would have been handy in this situation too bad foam=bad

Found this vintage pic of the site:

 

[Shannow]

I would agree with that. The windmills put up on the surrounding hills above Tehachipi in the last 5 years has ruined its mountain valley visual appeal. Passed through it many times, stopping for lunch a few times. Sue and I liked that town. We stayed there one night and had an outstanding beef dinner at a place I forget now. I remember both our meals being delicious.

Scott

35 years ago, when I started my engineering career in power, the transmission lines between the newest power station and the grid hub had to have the towers powder coated an olive colour, and the conductors anodised olive - considerably expensive...to reduce the visual impact.

last decade, the whole area has been covered in great white turbines...well not the whole area, there's a project to properly cover it with more...and city folk referring to the concerned residents as NIMBY, when they aren't having them in their oown.

 

[slo town]

35 years ago, when I started my engineering career in power, the transmission lines between the newest power station and the grid hub had to have the towers powder coated an olive colour, and the conductors anodised olive - considerably expensive...to reduce the visual impact.

last decade, the whole area has been covered in great white turbines...well not the whole area, there's a project to properly cover it with more...and city folk referring to the concerned residents as NIMBY, when they aren't having them in their oown.

To you point, this is what the mountains to the east of Tehachipi look like. At least a third of the surrounding mountains above Tehachipi are covered with these things. IMO, it totally destroys the semi-remote, high mountain desert charm of Tehachipi. In the great vastness of California there are better places to put these things.

Scott

 

[Snagglefoot]

Fire Fighting and Lithium Ion batterys are wrords that can't be used together.

Much like gunpowder, they store the energy in a chamical reaction, replete with it's own oxidiser, so the only part of the fire triangle that you can work on is heat.

Interesting debate here...we are trying to build a pumped hydro340/400 MW, 8/6 hours, at a nearby site, and a 500MW 4 hour battery adjacent to the power staton. Community outrage on the former, and a thrust to build batteries instead (from the community).

Ourpower station workers are wary of them, having had an increasing number of incidents of tool and equipment fires over past years.

Good info on the MW hr’s. Describing a battery with MW alone is only half the picture. The reporters who talk about the issues have no knowledge whatsoever.

 

[IndyIan]

1 nuclear accident in the United States
No one hurt with technology from the 1970s

Here is just one lithium back up power supply/ power plant for the California’s grid and as another posted there was actually three fires at that plant in about three years.

Well, depends on your definition of accident. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Nuclear_and_radiation_accidents_and_incidents
https://thewalrus.ca/nuclear-accidents/
Even now I've talked to a few guys who actually run and maintain our plants in Ontario and little "accidents" or problems happen every once in a while. The plants certainly are not maintenance free or fully automated, and lots of knowledgeable, experienced and well paid people inspect and test and fix all the systems all time.

I suspect they are trying to run battery grid storage plants with minimum of employees and lots of sensors and automation, and maybe finding the tech isn't quite there yet, or maybe won't be for a while?

 

[slo town]

Here's an even better perspective because Hwy 58 is in the frame. Hwy 58 is four lanes (2 in each direction). Hwy 58 bypasses downtown Tehachipi, but is only a mile or two north of the downtown core. The downtown core is off to the right a mile or two in the picture.

Sue and I drove through there recently. The turbines cover pretty much all of the NE, E, and SE of the surrounding mountains.

But here's the thing, over the ridgeline you see in this picture and the previous ones, there are many hundreds more turbines that the residents cannot see.

My wild guess tells me they could capture 80% of the wind energy of the area without blighting the hillsides above the town.

Why does it seem that this energy policy and market wants to suck every last breath out of the wind, even if it destroys the visual beauty of the nearby community?

Scott

 

[MVAR]

Yep, I spent decades in Los Gatos. A beautiful little town. The now impossible to afford Victorian homes in the Glen Ridge area were once occupied by drug dealing bikers (the '60s), Pennsylvania Avenue in particular. And on the Shannon and Kennedy Road side of town I used to drive my girlfriends up there where we'd park and have a good time. I had my first bicycle crash as an adult (late 30s) on Kennedy Road. Because my body slid on the roadway the crash ripped my cycling clothes to shreds. My "bum" was fully exposed and bleeding badly from both cheeks because of wicked road rash. I remember several motorists slow as they passed me while I made my way home, asking me "Are you okay?! Do you need help?" Humans can be nice at times. I used to see famous Olympic Champion figure skater Peggy Fleming at Los Gatos Coffee Roasting on a regular basis. She had a powerful elegance to her. We said "hi" to each other one time while standing in line together. She always struck me as being "normal". One time I got a speeding ticket (radar) while blasting down Loma Alta Avenue on my way to work one morning - on my bicycle. Sue and I got married in Los Gatos on Shannon Road, just a short distance from where I used to park with my girlfriends! Haha. And out where @JeffKeryk now lives - that was the "outback" of Los Gatos in the old days. Not much was there. Lots of memories in LG. It will always have a special place in my heart.

But Templeton is where we live now and my affection for it is just as great as my affection for Los Gatos. I adore my little Central Coast town.

Scott

View attachment 259554

Had a house right down the road from you on Vine St. in Paso. Sold it in '16. Wife's uncle used to have a place on Ridge Rd. in Templeton. Nice town & I miss the area, truly a gem in CA.

 

[MVAR]

Found this vintage pic of the site:
View attachment 259555

Oh man, how things have changed.

In Oct. of '01 (maybe Nov) someone in a small aircraft was flying over the facility & even split the stacks on 6 & 7 (the large ones in the picture). FBI was onsite as it was just after 9/11 & MLPP was/is a major west coast station. I was on a mezzanine deck about 2/3 the way up the boiler but between the units. Watching the plane & all the suites running around below was a site for a young man in his 20's at the time.

The next year there was a large jellyfish run in that harbor. I was stationed at the intake with a vacuum truck to suck up all the excess jellies as they overwhelmed the intake moving screens. Spent a few days doing nothing but cleaning up jellyfish

Oh the days when I used to actually work for my money & not sit in front of a gaggle of monitors & video walls. Brings back memories.

 

[OVERKILL]

Even now I've talked to a few guys who actually run and maintain our plants in Ontario and little "accidents" or problems happen every once in a while. The plants certainly are not maintenance free or fully automated, and lots of knowledgeable, experienced and well paid people inspect and test and fix all the systems all time.

And, because it's nuclear, every single one of them has to be reported to the CNSC, lol.
https://www.cnsc-ccsn.gc.ca/eng/act...ilities/event-reporting/nuclear-power-plants/
https://www.opg.com/reporting/regulatory-reporting/event-reports/

And yes, they employ thousands of people. They can do this because nuclear plants generate vast amounts of electricity and so these operating costs are baked into the rates paid for that electricity by ratepayers.

I suspect they are trying to run battery grid storage plants with minimum of employees and lots of sensors and automation, and maybe finding the tech isn't quite there yet, or maybe won't be for a while?

The problem with batteries is that they don't generate electricity, so any operating costs have to be baked into the round-trip costs of the (limited) energy being stored. This is on top of the capital cost that's trying to be paid back.

But even then, with lithium chemistry batteries (particularly Lithium Ion), fires can and do happen, it doesn't matter how much monitoring or how many employees there are. While there are fire suppression systems, once thermal runaway has started, you pretty much just have to let it burn itself out, which is what they did here, and try to prevent it from spreading to neighbouring packs. That's pretty much been the approach with all of these fires. This is why the packs are spaced like they are, to prevent spreading.

This isn't like a power plant where a series of bad things have to happen in order for a major event to occur due to the structure of redundant safeties and containment systems. Lithium ion batteries can, and do, just catch fire, usually caused by a dendrite triggering thermal runaway, and since they provide their own fuel and oxygen, you can't put them out via conventional methods, so it's usually about just pouring tons of water on them (thermal control) to prevent them from spreading while the parts that are currently combusting, use up their fuel.

I'm hopeful we start working on utilizing other chemistries that aren't prone to this issue.

 

[Shannow]

The problem with batteries is that they don't generate electricity, so any operating costs have to be baked into the round-trip costs of the (limited) energy being stored. This is on top of the capital cost that's trying to be paid back.

Modellers consider them a load that has to be met...with the ability to shift the time of use admittedly..
they lose 20% of what goes into them meaning that to replace 1,000 MW of thermal with solar/wind, you need to install 4,000MW nameplate, and if storage is introduced 5,000MW.

Was pricing a battery for my place and the costs were 25c/kWh even if I counted my rooftop as free.