Industry failure data puts most battery energy storage incidents in construction, commissioning and the first two years of operation, the window in which firefighters are least likely to have walked the site
SAN GABRIEL, Calif., Oct. 6, 2026 /PRNewswire-PRWeb/ -- Michael Karl McNeil, a former Fire Battalion Chief and the principal of McNeil Safety Consulting, is urging California fire agencies to plan for battery energy storage systems as a construction and commissioning hazard, not only as a hazard of finished, operating facilities.
The case rests on failure data. A May 2024 white paper from the Electric Power Research Institute found that 72 percent of battery storage failures with a known system age occurred during construction, during commissioning, or within the first two years of operation. Faults traced to the battery cells themselves were a small minority, about 11 percent; the rest originated in balance-of-system components and controls, and integration, assembly and construction accounted for 46 percent of the root causes EPRI could classify.
"I spent 25 years as a firefighter and fire officer, and preplanning a building after it opens is something every company officer knows how to do," McNeil said. "The numbers say the risk on these sites is front-loaded. The highest-probability window is the one where the systems are being wired, energized and tested, with contractor crews on site, and that is the window fire agencies see least of."
California has moved in the same direction. The 2025 California Fire Code, in effect since January 1, 2026, regulates energy storage systems in Section 1207 and requires commissioning before a system is placed in service. Senate Bill 283, also effective January 1, 2026, requires battery storage developers to meet with the local fire department before filing an application and provides for a pre-operation inspection by the local fire department or the Office of the State Fire Marshal. The 2026 edition of NFPA 855 makes a hazard mitigation analysis the default and calls for the emergency response plan to be developed with the authority having jurisdiction.
McNeil recommends that fire agencies build on those requirements in three ways. First, put an inspector or company officer on site at first energization and during commissioning tests, when integration faults surface. Second, write exposure planning into the emergency response plan before the first battery arrives, including hydrogen fluoride. ACGIH sets a ceiling of 2 ppm for hydrogen fluoride, a level that integrated sampling methods built for full-shift averages are poorly suited to measure during a short, high-concentration release. Third, document every firefighter's exposure at a battery incident in the same record as the incident report, so the information exists if a health question arises years later.
The January 16, 2025 fire at the 300-megawatt Moss Landing facility showed how long a battery fire and its aftermath can occupy a fire agency. Data center construction, with its large uninterruptible power supply battery banks, adds to the number of sites passing through that commissioning window.
McNeil holds the Registered Environmental Professional, Registered Industrial Hygienist, Emergency Planning Professional and Qualified SWPPP Developer designations and is a Hazardous Materials Manager, HAZMAT Specialist and Incident Commander. He holds California State Fire Marshal and National Wildfire Coordinating Group credentials from his federal fire service and is a member of the American College of Occupational and Environmental Medicine and the American Industrial Hygiene Association.
About McNeil Safety Consulting
McNeil Safety Consulting, based in San Gabriel, California, provides environmental health and safety, industrial hygiene, emergency planning, OSHA and Cal/OSHA citation defense, and forensic and expert consulting to employers in seventeen states. More information is available at https://mcneilsafetyconsulting.com.
Media contact
Michael Karl McNeil
McNeil Safety Consulting
(626) 546-9384
https://mcneilsafetyconsulting.com
SOURCE McNeilsafetyconsulting
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