9 ms·

First Responders Unprepared for Electric Vehicle Fires: Report

colechristensen 6y ago
Quoting carbon monoxide as of it were a unique product of a battery fire immediately casts doubt as to any of this being a legitimate concern. Getting something so wrong ruins the credabity of the rest of the piece. (every fire involving carbon produces some CO especially when oxygen is limited and combustion becomes less and less complete)
- kube-system 6y ago
  It's an article by a tort lawyer who is commenting on the lack of training. It is not a engineering analysis -- in context, it is clear that those chemicals were simply listed as examples.
  - bigbubba 6y ago
    Carbon monoxide is presented as an example of a "Unique danger[s] associated with electric battery fires." Why should he get a pass for being a lawyer? That makes his ignorance more concerning, not less.
    - kube-system 6y ago
      The article does not say that CO is unique to battery fires, nor does it present a comparison of combustion byproducts. The authors occupation is relevant because it can help you determine the perspective from which the article is written. A tort lawyer is interested in the culpability for a wrong. And in the case of someone being injured by chemicals, they'd want to establish that the substance was harmful. Certainly, if the byproduct of battery fires was bubblegum and gumdrops, training might not be as important. The point of the sentence you're referring to is to establish that this is not the case, and therefore, the situation merits training.
  - mpalczewski 6y ago
    From the article "Unique Dangers Associated with Electric Battery Fires First, during an electric vehicle fire, over 100 organic chemicals are generated, including toxic gases like carbon monoxide and hydrogen cyanide, both of which are fatal to humans." It's propaganda. "primarily to influence an audience and further an agenda" You aren't getting any facts in there that don't further the authors claims, and the ones that are there are written in a dishonest way. If the author said that "during an electric vehicle fire, over 100 organic chemicals are generated as opposed a conventional vehicle fire where 10/100/1000 different organic chemicals are generated" at least you'd have a basis of comparison, as it is, it just written to sound scary without informing you in any way what so ever.
    - kube-system 6y ago
      Of course. I am under no impression that tort lawyers are either experts in, or interested in, chemical engineering or firefighting practices. Their expertise is in illustrating culpability for civil wrongs. The author is simply establishing that the situation is dangerous and has inherent differences that would necessitate different training. The actual differences in combustion byproducts are 100% irrelevant to the main point. The author isn't highlighting the dangers of a conventional fire not because they are not dangerous, but because they are universally trained for.
      - deleted 6y ago
        [deleted]
quercusa 6y ago
> The U.S. National Transportation Safety Board (NTSB) recently issued a report showing that many fire departments lack the training and equipment needed to properly handle burning lithium-ion batteries. That survey was published in 2018 ('recently'), so probably collected in 2017. My son is a volunteer firefighter and he reports that they have had no shortage of training on EVs. And that they don't do anything without proper PPE.
- kube-system 6y ago
  The article does say that 31% of those surveyed didn't have the training, so presumably, the majority of departments do have the training. Given the number of poor rural volunteer departments in the US that struggle with funding, I would assume that 31% probably overlaps with the set that are struggling in general.
  - gowld 6y ago
    Also raises the question of what share of EVs are in poor rural jurisdictions. EVs are more popular in urban areas that have charging infrastructure and shorter-range trips.
    - almost_usual 6y ago
      I see EVs in rural California all the time. If an EV gets into an accident on its way to a national park the closest fire department is going to respond.
londons_explore 6y ago
The issue of EV batteries reigniting after a crash seems very solvable... For example, every battery cell could have a built in discharge circuit. Whenever the cell no longer received a signal from the cars computer indicating "the car is healthy" it goes into failsafe mode. Failsafe mode consists of every cell discharging to zero volts through a PTC resistor to keep a constant temperature of 150 degrees C. That will discharge cells as quickly as possible while avoiding starting a fire. If the vehicle cooling system is functioning, the whole battery will probably be discharged in 30 mins. If it is not, emergency crews can spray water on the battery and it'll be safe as soon as it's cool. Or they can not spray water and know that it'll stay at a constant (hot) temperature, but that thermal runaway isn't possible due to the PTC heating.
- bleepblorp 6y ago
  You'll make a fortune if you can find a way to convert 40-150 KWhr of electrical energy to heat quickly enough to make a difference in an emergency situation without causing the car to combust (or explode). You'll make a fortune because you'll have broken the laws of physics.
  - jeffbee 6y ago
    That's only enough energy to vaporize about 200 kilos of water. How much coolant is already in a Tesla battery pack?
    - TylerE 6y ago
      That's a lot of energy. Have you ever seen video of even a small steam explosion?
    - murderfs 6y ago
      200kg of steam takes up 340,000L at 1 atmosphere of pressure: you've just turned your battery fire into a car shaped bomb.
  - londons_explore 6y ago
hikerclimber 6y ago
nice! hopefully a lot of people die because of our government.
dreamcompiler 6y ago
Firefighter/EMT here. Our department has trained on hybrids (don't cut the big orange cable!)[0] but not electric per se. Doesn't matter. Unless there's someone in the car, we're going to stand back, let it burn, and keep it from spreading. Cars contain bigger hazards than batteries: Airbags are basically bombs, and gas lifters (the things that make the hatchback open smoothly) can become missles in a fire. And that bit about cyanide? Ha! When your sofa catches on fire it releases cyanide. That's why we wear positive pressure SCBAs. [0] We typically cut battery cables on conventional cars to lessen the danger of an airbag exploding in our face during a rescue.
- FireBeyond 6y ago
  > Our department has trained on hybrids (don't cut the big orange cable!) Keep training up to date. Hybrid HV wiring has a conductive sheath around the actual wiring, separated by non conductive layers. The purpose of this is that when your tool cuts such wiring, it shorts the sheath first and trips a breaker, so that you should be able to cut. There's a group near here (WA state) that does demos including "throwing" (dropping) battery packs into wading pools while still supplying power, and cutting HV cables on running hybrids to demonstrate this. But then again, there's near zero reason to do so. Stabilize the vehicle, kill the 12V. Our general go-to? Put the hazard lights on. If you stop the hazards, the vehicle is "generally electrically safe". Biggest risk that isn't often talked about? HID headlights. Picture being up against the frame of the car. Regular headlights, bulb broken, possibly? Pretty low risk. Broken headlight, and behind it is a high voltage arc? That's a very real electrocution hazard.
  - dreamcompiler 6y ago
    Holy crap! I learned a lot from this; gonna research and take it to the crew. Thanks and stay safe!
    - FireBeyond 6y ago
      You too. For sure, I remember when I got an 07 Prius, and we started talking about this stuff, and there was a lot of urban legends and myths. That being said, while electricity obeys the laws of physics, MVA/MVCs throws a wild card into the equation. I err on the side of caution... "Why am I cutting this cable if the vehicle is powered down and stabilized?"
exabrial 6y ago
One of my firefighter friends says they're a little fearful of using the jaws of life on electric vehicles since cutting through a high-voltage electrical cable would be disastrous. Luckily there are so few models right now they can memorize no-go places, but obviously this can't be counted on forever.
- LatteLazy 6y ago
  Edit: Cell voltage in a tesla is only 4.1V max. But there are systems with up to 375 total so I guess it's a valid question, especially as company's (not tesla AFAIK?) start putting cells into the body to squeeze as many as possible in... Original question: Isn't it all low voltage?
  - stickfigure 6y ago
    Maybe if you work for PG&E. The internet says Tesla packs are 350-375 volts. Definitely has the potential to ruin your day.
  - xxpor 6y ago
    Superchargers charge at 480V max, which from my understanding go directly into the cells (there's two phases in lithium battery charging, constant current and constant voltage. I'm fairly certain the constant voltage is for when the battery is low) So technically not "high voltage" as defined by the NEC (that starts at 600V), but still plenty enough to kill you. Especially if you're wet.
    - function_seven 6y ago
      > (...I'm fairly certain the constant voltage is for when the battery is low) Backwards. When the cell is low, the charging is at a constant current. The current is limited to whatever is deemed safe for the battery. Once the battery has charged to 80% or so, then the voltage will have reached the top, and any attempt to maintain the current will over-volt the cells. So the current is allowed to taper off as the voltage is held constant. For a single cell, that means the charger will apply whatever voltage is needed to deliver, say, 1 amp. Then when the voltage hits the 4.2V ceiling, it will stay there as the current naturally decays. A 100% charge is declared when the current falls below some threshold, like 50mA.
gumby 6y ago
I’m surprised as I read when the Prius was introduced that they’d done an educational campaign specifically about this (both battery fires and how to cut the car open without electrocuting yourself). I’d assumed this was a regulatory requirement.
- kube-system 6y ago
  Some states do not require any mandatory training for volunteer firefighters.
foobar1962 6y ago
I was a flag marshall at a race track a year or so ago, one of the classes racing was the Radical, a lightweight mini LeMans car based on a hight performance motor cycle engine. They are pretty awesome. One car was a full battery EV which they were testing out. We were instructed that if it crashed and caught fire were were NOT to assist ourself but to wait for the main team to arrive. As an aside, the eRadical was some 300kg heavier than the ICE version but otherwise identical. As for competition: there wasn't any. From the flag drop at the start the eRadical jumped ahead (thanks to electric engines offering 100% torque at 0 rpm) and held that lead throughout the race. The only time it didn't;t finish first was the last race of the day which was double length: it DNF due to exhausted battery.
IgorPartola 6y ago
Tesla had a really good set of videos on how to respond to emergencies involving electric vehicles. They obviously showed it on a Tesla but I thought it was really well made in that they talked about other designs and what will be in common and what won’t. I am not a first responder so there is little direct reason for me to know this but I spent several hours watching the videos anyways simply because they were so interesting and so well made. Similarly, I really liked the video from an ER doctor who races motorcycles about responding to motorcycle crashes. Highly recommend learning more about this as you very well might be the first person there and the dangers are non-obvious. And of course I highly recommend taking a CPR course and carrying a first aid kit, including a mouth to mouth membrane, with you in your vehicle. You never know when you’ll be in a position to save a life. Edit: Tesla emergency responder resources: https://www.tesla.com/firstresponders https://www.tesla.com/firstresponders Motorcycle crash response: https://youtu.be/MsZBXlTHPCg https://youtu.be/MsZBXlTHPCg Red Cross CPR certification: https://www.redcross.org/take-a-class/cpr/cpr-training/cpr-certification https://www.redcross.org/take-a-class/cpr/cpr-training/cpr-c...
- kiddico 6y ago
  The guy in the motorcycle video is just an all around fun presenter! Good recommendation. edit: Seems as though Dr. Hinds is no longer with us. Accident while providing medical care at an event. Damn. Gotta say that's a commendable and badass way to go.
- 3pt14159 6y ago
  I've saved a couple of lives before. I resuscitated one guy's breathing after he'd choked on his own vomit behind a speaker at an open air concert. I only saw him because I like to stand behind the speakers where it isn't as loud. It sure was nasty having to give mouth to mouth without a membrane, but the lifesaving training[0] I did as a kid didn't even mention them. Anyway, I got the guy breathing and instructed others to get the medics and got some antiseptic for my hands, since I had to remove the vomit from his mouth with them, but unfortunately there was no mouthwash available. I'd do it again, but if there is any story out there for you to realize the benefit of mouth to mouth membranes this is it. [0] Did up to bronze cross but I failed one of the swimming tests because I accidentally did the racing version of a stroke instead of the life saving version. It's hard to unlearn things that were hammered into you in a sports mindset.
Animats 6y ago
It's too bad that lithium iron phosphate batteries lost out to lithium-ion. Lithium iron phosphate batteries don't go into thermal runaway and will not blow up from the "nail test", where a nail is driven into the battery. It's a safer chemistry, but lower energy density. It found a niche in pro hand power tools for a while, but even there, lost out. BYD is trying to turn that around. They always liked lithium iron phosphate technology, and now they're going back to it, with a new design, the "blade battery"[1] More KWH per cubic meter, even if KWH per kilogram isn't much higher. Also, no nickel or cobalt, so the materials cost is lower. This could be interesting for fixed applications. If it sits in your garage, or on a concrete pad at a power station, you don't care too much about how much it weighs. [1] https://youtu.be/dIt5z4wT9RE?t=616 https://youtu.be/dIt5z4wT9RE?t=616
- fy20 6y ago
  Isn't LiFePo4 cheaper too? For luxury cars maybe that's not a problem, but for the EV version of an VW Polo, cost is going to be a lot more important. A lot of budget Chinese EVs use it.
- rrmoelker 6y ago
  Tesla mentioned using iron in the lower end electric vehicles [1]. Though I don't know if that is the safe composition you are mentioning. [1] https://youtu.be/l6T9xIeZTds?t=4221 https://youtu.be/l6T9xIeZTds?t=4221
DoingIsLearning 6y ago
Another threat that was not discussed, is HF (Flouride gas) release from Li-ion battery packs during a fire. [0] I contracted for work on EV chargers software in the past, those R&D garages had HF detectors. The H&S procedure is to literally GTFO as soon as that alarm goes off. HF gas will burn any human tissue upon contact with moisture, that _includes_ your eyeballs. HF detectors should probably become standard gear for Fire departments. [0] https://www.researchgate.net/publication/319368068_Toxic_fluoride_gas_emissions_from_lithium-ion_battery_fires https://www.researchgate.net/publication/319368068_Toxic_flu...

Quoting carbon monoxide as of it were a unique product of a battery fire immediately casts doubt as to any of this being a legitimate concern. Getting something so wrong ruins the credabity of the rest of the piece. (every fire involving carbon produces some CO especially when oxygen is limited and combustion becomes less and less complete)

kube-system 6y ago
It's an article by a tort lawyer who is commenting on the lack of training. It is not a engineering analysis -- in context, it is clear that those chemicals were simply listed as examples.
- bigbubba 6y ago
  Carbon monoxide is presented as an example of a "Unique danger[s] associated with electric battery fires." Why should he get a pass for being a lawyer? That makes his ignorance more concerning, not less.
  - kube-system 6y ago
    The article does not say that CO is unique to battery fires, nor does it present a comparison of combustion byproducts. The authors occupation is relevant because it can help you determine the perspective from which the article is written. A tort lawyer is interested in the culpability for a wrong. And in the case of someone being injured by chemicals, they'd want to establish that the substance was harmful. Certainly, if the byproduct of battery fires was bubblegum and gumdrops, training might not be as important. The point of the sentence you're referring to is to establish that this is not the case, and therefore, the situation merits training.
- mpalczewski 6y ago
  From the article "Unique Dangers Associated with Electric Battery Fires First, during an electric vehicle fire, over 100 organic chemicals are generated, including toxic gases like carbon monoxide and hydrogen cyanide, both of which are fatal to humans." It's propaganda. "primarily to influence an audience and further an agenda" You aren't getting any facts in there that don't further the authors claims, and the ones that are there are written in a dishonest way. If the author said that "during an electric vehicle fire, over 100 organic chemicals are generated as opposed a conventional vehicle fire where 10/100/1000 different organic chemicals are generated" at least you'd have a basis of comparison, as it is, it just written to sound scary without informing you in any way what so ever.
  - kube-system 6y ago
    Of course. I am under no impression that tort lawyers are either experts in, or interested in, chemical engineering or firefighting practices. Their expertise is in illustrating culpability for civil wrongs. The author is simply establishing that the situation is dangerous and has inherent differences that would necessitate different training. The actual differences in combustion byproducts are 100% irrelevant to the main point. The author isn't highlighting the dangers of a conventional fire not because they are not dangerous, but because they are universally trained for.
    - deleted 6y ago
      [deleted]

quercusa 6y ago

> The U.S. National Transportation Safety Board (NTSB) recently issued a report showing that many fire departments lack the training and equipment needed to properly handle burning lithium-ion batteries. That survey was published in 2018 ('recently'), so probably collected in 2017. My son is a volunteer firefighter and he reports that they have had no shortage of training on EVs. And that they don't do anything without proper PPE.

kube-system 6y ago
The article does say that 31% of those surveyed didn't have the training, so presumably, the majority of departments do have the training. Given the number of poor rural volunteer departments in the US that struggle with funding, I would assume that 31% probably overlaps with the set that are struggling in general.
- gowld 6y ago
  Also raises the question of what share of EVs are in poor rural jurisdictions. EVs are more popular in urban areas that have charging infrastructure and shorter-range trips.
  - almost_usual 6y ago
    I see EVs in rural California all the time. If an EV gets into an accident on its way to a national park the closest fire department is going to respond.

londons_explore 6y ago

The issue of EV batteries reigniting after a crash seems very solvable... For example, every battery cell could have a built in discharge circuit. Whenever the cell no longer received a signal from the cars computer indicating "the car is healthy" it goes into failsafe mode. Failsafe mode consists of every cell discharging to zero volts through a PTC resistor to keep a constant temperature of 150 degrees C. That will discharge cells as quickly as possible while avoiding starting a fire. If the vehicle cooling system is functioning, the whole battery will probably be discharged in 30 mins. If it is not, emergency crews can spray water on the battery and it'll be safe as soon as it's cool. Or they can not spray water and know that it'll stay at a constant (hot) temperature, but that thermal runaway isn't possible due to the PTC heating.

bleepblorp 6y ago
You'll make a fortune if you can find a way to convert 40-150 KWhr of electrical energy to heat quickly enough to make a difference in an emergency situation without causing the car to combust (or explode). You'll make a fortune because you'll have broken the laws of physics.
- jeffbee 6y ago
  That's only enough energy to vaporize about 200 kilos of water. How much coolant is already in a Tesla battery pack?
  - TylerE 6y ago
    That's a lot of energy. Have you ever seen video of even a small steam explosion?
  - murderfs 6y ago
    200kg of steam takes up 340,000L at 1 atmosphere of pressure: you've just turned your battery fire into a car shaped bomb.
- londons_explore 6y ago

hikerclimber 6y ago

nice! hopefully a lot of people die because of our government.

dreamcompiler 6y ago

Firefighter/EMT here. Our department has trained on hybrids (don't cut the big orange cable!)[0] but not electric per se. Doesn't matter. Unless there's someone in the car, we're going to stand back, let it burn, and keep it from spreading. Cars contain bigger hazards than batteries: Airbags are basically bombs, and gas lifters (the things that make the hatchback open smoothly) can become missles in a fire. And that bit about cyanide? Ha! When your sofa catches on fire it releases cyanide. That's why we wear positive pressure SCBAs. [0] We typically cut battery cables on conventional cars to lessen the danger of an airbag exploding in our face during a rescue.

FireBeyond 6y ago
> Our department has trained on hybrids (don't cut the big orange cable!) Keep training up to date. Hybrid HV wiring has a conductive sheath around the actual wiring, separated by non conductive layers. The purpose of this is that when your tool cuts such wiring, it shorts the sheath first and trips a breaker, so that you should be able to cut. There's a group near here (WA state) that does demos including "throwing" (dropping) battery packs into wading pools while still supplying power, and cutting HV cables on running hybrids to demonstrate this. But then again, there's near zero reason to do so. Stabilize the vehicle, kill the 12V. Our general go-to? Put the hazard lights on. If you stop the hazards, the vehicle is "generally electrically safe". Biggest risk that isn't often talked about? HID headlights. Picture being up against the frame of the car. Regular headlights, bulb broken, possibly? Pretty low risk. Broken headlight, and behind it is a high voltage arc? That's a very real electrocution hazard.
- dreamcompiler 6y ago
  Holy crap! I learned a lot from this; gonna research and take it to the crew. Thanks and stay safe!
  - FireBeyond 6y ago
    You too. For sure, I remember when I got an 07 Prius, and we started talking about this stuff, and there was a lot of urban legends and myths. That being said, while electricity obeys the laws of physics, MVA/MVCs throws a wild card into the equation. I err on the side of caution... "Why am I cutting this cable if the vehicle is powered down and stabilized?"

exabrial 6y ago

One of my firefighter friends says they're a little fearful of using the jaws of life on electric vehicles since cutting through a high-voltage electrical cable would be disastrous. Luckily there are so few models right now they can memorize no-go places, but obviously this can't be counted on forever.

LatteLazy 6y ago
Edit: Cell voltage in a tesla is only 4.1V max. But there are systems with up to 375 total so I guess it's a valid question, especially as company's (not tesla AFAIK?) start putting cells into the body to squeeze as many as possible in... Original question: Isn't it all low voltage?
- stickfigure 6y ago
  Maybe if you work for PG&E. The internet says Tesla packs are 350-375 volts. Definitely has the potential to ruin your day.
- xxpor 6y ago
  Superchargers charge at 480V max, which from my understanding go directly into the cells (there's two phases in lithium battery charging, constant current and constant voltage. I'm fairly certain the constant voltage is for when the battery is low) So technically not "high voltage" as defined by the NEC (that starts at 600V), but still plenty enough to kill you. Especially if you're wet.
  - function_seven 6y ago
    > (...I'm fairly certain the constant voltage is for when the battery is low) Backwards. When the cell is low, the charging is at a constant current. The current is limited to whatever is deemed safe for the battery. Once the battery has charged to 80% or so, then the voltage will have reached the top, and any attempt to maintain the current will over-volt the cells. So the current is allowed to taper off as the voltage is held constant. For a single cell, that means the charger will apply whatever voltage is needed to deliver, say, 1 amp. Then when the voltage hits the 4.2V ceiling, it will stay there as the current naturally decays. A 100% charge is declared when the current falls below some threshold, like 50mA.

gumby 6y ago

I’m surprised as I read when the Prius was introduced that they’d done an educational campaign specifically about this (both battery fires and how to cut the car open without electrocuting yourself). I’d assumed this was a regulatory requirement.

kube-system 6y ago
Some states do not require any mandatory training for volunteer firefighters.

foobar1962 6y ago

I was a flag marshall at a race track a year or so ago, one of the classes racing was the Radical, a lightweight mini LeMans car based on a hight performance motor cycle engine. They are pretty awesome. One car was a full battery EV which they were testing out. We were instructed that if it crashed and caught fire were were NOT to assist ourself but to wait for the main team to arrive. As an aside, the eRadical was some 300kg heavier than the ICE version but otherwise identical. As for competition: there wasn't any. From the flag drop at the start the eRadical jumped ahead (thanks to electric engines offering 100% torque at 0 rpm) and held that lead throughout the race. The only time it didn't;t finish first was the last race of the day which was double length: it DNF due to exhausted battery.

IgorPartola 6y ago

Tesla had a really good set of videos on how to respond to emergencies involving electric vehicles. They obviously showed it on a Tesla but I thought it was really well made in that they talked about other designs and what will be in common and what won’t. I am not a first responder so there is little direct reason for me to know this but I spent several hours watching the videos anyways simply because they were so interesting and so well made. Similarly, I really liked the video from an ER doctor who races motorcycles about responding to motorcycle crashes. Highly recommend learning more about this as you very well might be the first person there and the dangers are non-obvious. And of course I highly recommend taking a CPR course and carrying a first aid kit, including a mouth to mouth membrane, with you in your vehicle. You never know when you’ll be in a position to save a life. Edit: Tesla emergency responder resources: https://www.tesla.com/firstresponders https://www.tesla.com/firstresponders Motorcycle crash response: https://youtu.be/MsZBXlTHPCg https://youtu.be/MsZBXlTHPCg Red Cross CPR certification: https://www.redcross.org/take-a-class/cpr/cpr-training/cpr-certification https://www.redcross.org/take-a-class/cpr/cpr-training/cpr-c...

kiddico 6y ago
The guy in the motorcycle video is just an all around fun presenter! Good recommendation. edit: Seems as though Dr. Hinds is no longer with us. Accident while providing medical care at an event. Damn. Gotta say that's a commendable and badass way to go.
3pt14159 6y ago
I've saved a couple of lives before. I resuscitated one guy's breathing after he'd choked on his own vomit behind a speaker at an open air concert. I only saw him because I like to stand behind the speakers where it isn't as loud. It sure was nasty having to give mouth to mouth without a membrane, but the lifesaving training[0] I did as a kid didn't even mention them. Anyway, I got the guy breathing and instructed others to get the medics and got some antiseptic for my hands, since I had to remove the vomit from his mouth with them, but unfortunately there was no mouthwash available. I'd do it again, but if there is any story out there for you to realize the benefit of mouth to mouth membranes this is it. [0] Did up to bronze cross but I failed one of the swimming tests because I accidentally did the racing version of a stroke instead of the life saving version. It's hard to unlearn things that were hammered into you in a sports mindset.

Animats 6y ago

It's too bad that lithium iron phosphate batteries lost out to lithium-ion. Lithium iron phosphate batteries don't go into thermal runaway and will not blow up from the "nail test", where a nail is driven into the battery. It's a safer chemistry, but lower energy density. It found a niche in pro hand power tools for a while, but even there, lost out. BYD is trying to turn that around. They always liked lithium iron phosphate technology, and now they're going back to it, with a new design, the "blade battery"[1] More KWH per cubic meter, even if KWH per kilogram isn't much higher. Also, no nickel or cobalt, so the materials cost is lower. This could be interesting for fixed applications. If it sits in your garage, or on a concrete pad at a power station, you don't care too much about how much it weighs. [1] https://youtu.be/dIt5z4wT9RE?t=616 https://youtu.be/dIt5z4wT9RE?t=616

fy20 6y ago
Isn't LiFePo4 cheaper too? For luxury cars maybe that's not a problem, but for the EV version of an VW Polo, cost is going to be a lot more important. A lot of budget Chinese EVs use it.
rrmoelker 6y ago
Tesla mentioned using iron in the lower end electric vehicles [1]. Though I don't know if that is the safe composition you are mentioning. [1] https://youtu.be/l6T9xIeZTds?t=4221 https://youtu.be/l6T9xIeZTds?t=4221

DoingIsLearning 6y ago

Another threat that was not discussed, is HF (Flouride gas) release from Li-ion battery packs during a fire. [0] I contracted for work on EV chargers software in the past, those R&D garages had HF detectors. The H&S procedure is to literally GTFO as soon as that alarm goes off. HF gas will burn any human tissue upon contact with moisture, that _includes_ your eyeballs. HF detectors should probably become standard gear for Fire departments. [0] https://www.researchgate.net/publication/319368068_Toxic_fluoride_gas_emissions_from_lithium-ion_battery_fires https://www.researchgate.net/publication/319368068_Toxic_flu...