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Residents urge council to act on proposed battery energy storage site; cite Moss Landing fire and evacuation risks
Summary
A resident spoke about a planned battery energy storage facility at 4200 Industrial Place in Hempstead and urged Long Beach officials to push back, citing fire, toxic-fume and evacuation concerns and listing nearby schools within an evacuation radius.
A Long Beach resident on Tuesday urged the council to intervene or press regional officials about a proposed battery energy storage system (BESS) at 4200 Industrial Place in neighboring Hempstead, saying the project would place large populations and schools within potential evacuation zones if a fire or toxic release occurred.
Christina Kramer, a member of a local advocacy group, told the council she and other residents had attended Hempstead meetings and tracked a December 2024 permit for the company identified as Rhineland to place a BESS at the Industrial Place site. Kramer cited the high-profile Moss Landing BESS fire in California and presented evacuation-radius calculations to the council: evacuating a one-mile radius from the Hempstead site, she said, would involve an estimated 10,000 people and would include Lincoln Orens Middle School, Long Beach High School, Long Beach Middle School and East Elementary School within shorter radii.
“I'm always here — you guys are all our front lines. We need you to be speaking up for us,” Kramer said, asking for elected officials to press county and state representatives and to coordinate regional action.
Council members said they would raise the issue with regional bodies and with the New York Conference of Mayors. One council member said he had discussed BESS fire response and municipal positions with the conference’s energy committee and planned to push the organization to adopt a formal municipal position on how best to respond to BESS incidents and on safety requirements.
Why it matters: battery energy storage projects are increasingly proposed and have prompted municipal concern after several high-profile fires; residents argued that a nearby large-scale facility could introduce evacuation and air‑quality risks to Long Beach neighborhoods and schools.
What happens next: council members said they will follow up with regional partners and with the New York Conference of Mayors; residents asked city officials to relay concerns to county and state representatives and to request more information from Hempstead about the project and its emergency-response planning.
