'Extremely disturbing': High levels of heavy metals at Monterey estuary after lithium battery site fire [View all]

‘Extremely disturbing’: High levels of heavy metals at Monterey estuary after lithium battery site fire

LA Times | Clara Harter | Jan. 29, 2025

Days after one of the world’s largest lithium ion battery storage facilities burst into flames in Monterey County, researchers found alarmingly high concentrations of heavy metals at a nearby estuary that is home to several endangered species.

Scientists at San José State University recorded a dramatic increase in nickel, manganese and cobalt — materials used in lithium ion batteries — in soil samples at the Elkhorn Slough Reserve after the recent fire at the nearby Moss Landing Power Plant.

The toxic metals threaten to upset the delicate ecosystem at the Elkhorn Slough, which is the state’s second-largest estuary and plays a key role in sequestering carbon emissions and protecting the coastline from sea level rise, said Ivano Aiello, chair of the university’s Moss Landing Marine Laboratories.

Aiello, who has monitored environmental conditions at the slough for more than a decade, said he was shocked by the results.

The concentration of nickel, manganese and cobalt measured on the surface of the soil is hundreds to thousands of times as much as the levels in the surface soil prior to the fire or compared with levels measured deeper in the soil...more
https://www.latimes.com/california/story/2025-01-29/heavy-metals-found-in-monterey-estuary-after-moss-landing-lithium-battery-fire


Ivano Aiello of Moss Landing Marine Laboratories conducts soil sampling at the Elkhorn Slough Reserve. (San José State University / Moss Landing Marine Laboratories)