The fire in Otay Mesa, as well as other fires at battery facilities across the country, are giving Californians pause.
The fires produce hydrogen, which burns with very little oxygen, making these fires very difficult to smother.
Battery fires also produce deadly toxic gasses, such as hydrogen fluoride, hydrogen cyanide, hydrogen chloride and sulfur dioxide.
On April 19, 2019, a fire captain, a fire engineer and two career firefighters suffered serious injuries dealing with a thermal runaway incident at a 2.16-megawatt battery facility in Surprise, Arizona.
Sean DeCrane, director of health and safety operational services for the International Association of Fire Fighters, attended a conference on energy storage system fires in Arizona this month.
The biggest risk to firefighters trying to attack a burning battery system, he said, is the hydrogen gas that the fires give off.
According to the American Clean Power Association, a renewable energy industry group, the number of fire incidents at ESS facilities is increasing, but it is decreasing as a percentage of the amount of battery storage deployed.
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