There have been some new developments surrounding the fire that raged at the Moss Landing Battery Plant in January and reignited in February, including a community survey, warnings from the EPA about potential flare-ups, and Erin Brockovich helping residents in a lawsuit, and new legislation.

The January fire at the battery plant in Moss Landing caused the evacuation of 1,200 residents, and the community has since been dealing with ongoing side effects, including headaches, nausea, and sore throats. According to KSBW in Monterey, the Health Departments of Monterey, San Benito, and Santa Cruz Counties are currently conducting a community survey in collaboration with the California Department of Public Health about the fire's impact on residents' health, which ends on Friday.

The EPA issued a warning that there's still the potential for more flare-ups at the plant as workers continue to clean up the site and delink the batteries that caused the initial fire. Officials at the plant said that a private fire company and air resource monitors are watching the site around the clock.

Additionally, Mercury News reports that famed environmental activist Erin Brockovich is working with a San Diego law firm to represent the residents of Moss Landing against Vistra Corp, the company that owns the plant, as well as other defendants, including PG&E, which operates another energy storage facility at the Moss Landing plant.

Although Vistra says testing of the air, soil, and water in the area show no risks to public health, Brockovich thinks the company is concealing information. The lawsuit claims that the amount of cobalt, manganese, nickel, and copper in the preliminary state data exceeded federal EPA risk levels for residential soil. The lawsuit also alleges that the facility’s fire-suppression system was deficient.

Brockovich also told Mercury News that the state's rush to implement cleaner energy standards could be exacerbating the problem:

I’m concerned that in our quest to do something good, we’re not going to do it right. And then we’re going to have something bad — more fires. If you get fires like that in any Santa Ana wind condition, you could have a much larger, uncontrollable scenario.

The state is pushing through in haste, to hurry. They’re not going to catch their mistakes, and we’re going to have a bigger problem.

Mercury News notes that a dozen more battery plants are being planned in California, which raises concerns about the health and wellbeing of residents near these new facilities. A new bill has been introduced by Assemblywoman Dawn Addis, D-Morro Bay, (AB 303), which would ban new battery storage plants from being built within 3,200 feet of homes, schools, businesses, and hospitals.

Image: Sgerbic/Wikimedia

Previously: Yet Another Battery Fire at Monterey County’s Moss Landing Power Plant, Just 33 Days After Its Last Battery Fire

Forest fires play a crucial role in natural life cycles — it's just that human activity is exacerbating that rhythm. In order to give Mother Nature a leg up after the flames cease, Santa Cruz researchers are using oyster mushrooms to help break down the ash from previous wildfires.

Technically speaking, we're not even in wildfire season yet; that's not going to happen until the beginning of June. But the Bay Area is already seeing Red Flag Warnings, brush fires, and other signs of an impending wildfire season that could rival last year's historically destructive one.

Once a forest is scorched and scared by blazes, it can take as long as 80 years for soil compositions and plant fauna to fully recover — a healing process that's happening far too many times because of the climate crisis. Suffice to say eight decades is a long time for any single ecosystem to get back to square one.

That's why a team of Bay Area researchers are experimenting with the idea of introducing oyster mushrooms to speed up that process, potentially also helping mitigate the risk of future wildfires.

CoRenewal (formerly known as Amazon MycoRenewal Project) is a nonprofit organization that's dedicated its work to ecosystem restoration — here in the Bay Area and elsewhere across the world. The cohort of scientists works in tandem to develop nature-based solutions to human-caused environmental damage, with a recent focus on wildfire pollution.

Three of its current projects — "Fungal Facilitation and Fire" and "Post-Fire Watershed Defense" — explore the benefits of strategically growing fungi, which include varieties of oyster mushroom, to reduce acidic water runoff and help breakdown toxic ash into bio-available compounds. (While cleansing rains after a fire help put out lingering embers, they're also responsible for ash-runoffs entering surrounding waterways that can cause mass die-offs of fish, amphibians, and other aquatic or semi-aquatic life.)

But there's another conceivable upside to introducing these fungi: less dead ground cover plants that might otherwise be burned during a wildfire.

When fungi begin decomposing organisms, be it flora or fauna, they help to release crucial elements back into the soil for later utilization by the surrounding nature. A welcome byproduct off this natural process is that fewer fallen leaves and pieces of timber are left to potentially kindle. (Conversely, when an ecosystem is out of balance and natural-occurring fungi are in low numbers, it aids in creating an environment ripe for wildfires.)

At the moment, CoRenewal is conducting experiments in Santa Cruz — inside an area burned by the CZU Lighting Complex Fire — and Butte County, where participating scientists and volunteers are collaborating with land managers to assess the efficacy of this environmental initiative. Both projects are largely supported by federal grant money and partnered universities, like Sydney Glassman’s Fungal Ecology Lab at UC Riverside, and will continue on for some time until enough data is gathered.

For more information on CoRenewal, as well as how you can help aid their efforts, visit amazonmycorenewal.org.

Conserve water when and where you can. Lighten your carbon footprint. And for all that's left holy on this mortal coil: hold off on the pyrotechnic gender reveal parties this summer — for, like, ever.

Related: First Red Flag Warning of Fire Season Issued for North and East Bay Hills

45-Acre Brush Fire in Solano County Has Been Contained

Image: Getty Images/lensblur

In an out-of-the-blue announcement, San Francisco International Airport declared that H2O in plastic bottles will no longer be welcome at SFO, the first such move for any major U.S. airport.

We’ve gotten used to being forced to dump liquids at TSA checkpoints for years, but San Francisco International Airport is making an unprecedented, and frankly laudable move to further excommunicate commonly consumed liquids. Specifically bottled water, which represents a massive global environmental nuisance. In a surprise announcement reported by the San Francisco Chronicle, SFO will ban the sale of single-use plastic water bottles at all restaurants, cafes, vending machines and shop in  the airport. You can still bring your own bottle, though shops will only sell refillable glass or aluminum bottles.

The ban takes effect August 20, less than three weeks from today.

“We’re the first airport that we’re aware of to implement this change,” SFO spokesperson Doug Yakel the Chronicle. “We’re on the leading edge for the industry, and we want to push the boundaries of sustainability initiatives.”

The Chron estimates that SFO sells four million plastic water bottles every year, so it’s a pretty significant disruption to travelers. The move is probably the most bold of any of the airport’s recent sustainability measures, which also include requiring restaurants to use compostable plates and utensils, and the addition of rooftop solar power. San Francisco International has been recognized as one of the most environmentally friendly in the country.

As ABC 7 notes, shops are already transitioning to refillable aluminum and glass bottles. And the airport already has more than 100 hydration stations for refilling, with more of those on the way.

It bears noting that bottled water is one of the most ridiculously marked up items at airports nationwide, having long passed the $5 mark for a measly 12-ounce bottle of water. That said, the reusable bottles you’ll be forced to buy instead will surely be more expensive. Traveler Tony Vargas probably captured how most of us feel about the impending bottled water ban coming to SFO.

When the Chronicle asked Vargas what he thinks about it, he said, “It’s great — kind of.”

Related: Central Valley Water Crisis Leaves Nearly 1.5 Million Without Clean Water [SFist]

Image: TheDigitel Myrtle Beach via Flickr