Reposted from the NoTricksZone
By P Gosselin on 7. November 2021
E-buses in Germany a “fire hazard” as batteries can heat up to 1000°C. German cities taking vehicles out of service as a precaution.
Even after years of fine-tuning, electric vehicle manufacturers still seem unable to get e-vehicle technology to work as safely as it needs to for personal and public transportation.
German media, for example here, report that currently electric buses are being withdrawn from service in cities because they pose a fire hazard. Earlier in June of this year in Hanover, Germany, a major fire destroyed nine buses belonging to the Üstra transport company and so the company took the remaining buses out of service until the exact cause is determined.
“Not just the case in Hanover, it is becoming increasingly common for electric vehicles to be removed from service in cities, and the reasons are often down to a common cause: Fire safety,” reports the online MK.
Stuttgart withdraw buses from service after fire
The Stuttgart transport authority also took buses out of service after an electric bus fire destroyed 25 vehicles. The MK also reports that the city of Regensburg also removed the same kind of electric bus from service for fear of fire.
According to the MK, the problem is the extremes heat generated by the vehicle’s batteries, which can reach temperatures of 1000°C due to “thermal runaway”.
15-meter safe parking distance
“In the process, the lithium-ion batteries release energy in an uncontrolled manner,” reports the MK. “For the same reason, electric cars also repeatedly catch fire. The first e-cars are now only allowed to park at a distance of 15 meters because of the risk of fire.”
Also in China e-buses were recorded bursting into flames as they charged:
Even e-scooters can burst into flames. The following example also shows how difficult it can be to extinguish e-vehicle fires.
Also read here: https://notrickszone.com/2021/06/11/electric-bus-inferno-in-hanover-germany-explosive-fire-causes-millions-in-damages/
e-scooter?
Don’t you mean an electric bike?
It definitely is not a scooter.
What ever the name is, it’s burning suddenly.
Look here:
A fire bomb by any name will still burn as hot
Well its not a bicycle.
Nor is it a motor cycle.
Nor is it a moped
Its a small wheeled two wheeled motorised vehicle.
I think scooter is all you could call it.
I said an electric bike not bicycle do try to keep up
What is your definition of a bike? Everywhere I’ve ever been, it is short for bicycle.
Do da name biker mean anything
It’s another name for motorcycle, everywhere I’ve been. I have literally never ever heard anyone referring to a bicycle as “my bike”. He would be ridiculed out of the city
maybe the city … in the country, a bike is a bicycle … and it can refer to a motorcycle … depends on who is talking and who is listening … a kid says my bike … its bicycle … middle aged dude says my bike … its a motorcycle …
yep.
Where the hell do you live? I know now one that has ever referred to a bicycle other than ‘bike’.
U.S.- both city and country.
Every American under the age of 16 would call their bike MY BIKE. How old are you or how short is your memory?
Nonsense.
My bike was my bike for decades. Only silly people insist on long words when short and sweet terms are readily available.
It was still “bike” when I went shopping for beginning first bikes and then later when it was time for more serious multi-gear bikes.
Everyone I rode with used “bike” almost exclusively.
The same went when I talked about my motorcycle.
Talking about the engine, mufflers, kick shifts, clutch, carburetor, fuel injection, oil and air filters, etc. all quickly focused exactly what bike means amongst motorcycle owners.
Where things really get contentious is when one is referring to a transcycle.
Depends on context. As the Dark Lord said when the little ones (teens and younger) say “bike” they’re probably referring to their bicycle (bike is literally short-hand for bicycle), when the adults say “bike” they’re probably referring to a motorcycle. (though some adults do still enjoy non-motorcycle bike activities)
some non-motorcycle bikes:
2021 Polygon Trid Dirt Jump Mountain Bike | Bikes Online (USA)
26″ Men’s Mongoose PT26 Dirt Jump or Pump Track Bike w/ Rear Disc Brake, Copper 38675240490 | eBay
Indeed, Leo.
Bicycles have no engine, since it has an engine, it’s not a bicycle.
Mopeds (MOtor PEDal) have an engine and pedals, this one does not have pedals, so not a moped.
That leaves us with either a motorcycle or scooter. As previously pointed out by myself and others, the characteristics of the vehicle in question fit that of a scooter rather than that of a motorcycle. So bottom line is that it’s a scooter despite the limited idea a certain someone has in regards to what a scooter is.
ETA: another distinguishing feature between mopeds, scooters, and motorcycles is engine size/power. Mopeds have the smallest engines/power, motorcycles the largest, with scooters somewhere inbetween.
“It definitely is not a scooter.”
It definitely is burning.
The point is “burning“, NOT the name of the thing!
For all those who clearly don’t know what an e-scooter is
https://www.escooter.co.uk/
Doh
Yep, you were thinking of definition #2. Thoes aren’t the only things only the market called scooters:
Razor Pocket Mod – 24V Miniature Euro-Style Electric Scooter, Vintage-Inspired Design, Hidden Storage below Cushioned Seat, Up to 15 mph and Up to 40 min Ride Time – Walmart.com
Ewheels BugEye 3 Wheel Scooter (discovermymobility.com)
double D’oh
Zzzz
You can’t admit to being wrong I see. Well, when you wake up, you’ll still be wrong. Too bad so sad.
Are those allowed on motorways?
I have no idea what the laws are regarding scooter are vis-a-vis the motorways, however from the Artisan EVC Electric Scooter writeup
Artisan EVC Electric Scooter (artisanscooters.com)
It certainly sounds like some of them are: “Designed with the inner city in mind but equally capable on the open road, this L3 category learner legal electric scooter has performance to spare”
The point, of course, is that scooters aren’t limited to what fretslider thinks of when he sees the word scooter, no matter how many naps he wishes to take when that fact is pointed out to him.
In the US depending on the State laws, they are not only allowed on the roads, but the driver is not required to have a driver’s license depending on the maximum horsepower/speed.
Higher power output/speeds makes them motorcycles, thus requiring a driver’s license.
Can you maintain a consistent minimum speed of 45 mph or 50 mph?
The Artisan EVC Electric Scooter apparently has a maximum speed of 46 mph and a range of 46 miles.
https://wattsupwiththat.com/2021/11/08/e-vehicle-woes-german-cities-remove-e-buses-from-service-after-bursting-in-flames-fire-hazard/#comment-3383628
Some more scooters that don’t look anything like your idea of scooters:
Yamaha Scooters (yamahamotorsports.com)
And here’s an EV scooter (which actually looks somewhat like the scooter in the video.
Artisan EVC Electric Scooter (artisanscooters.com)
In most countries the definition of a scooter is it has a running board where you put your feet. The motorcycle has foot pegs and this tends to be the key defining difference. However I am sure there are exceptions out there.
Back in 1953, a movie “Roman Holiday” starring Gregory Peck and Audrey Hepburn was released.
A scooter was a main form of transportation in the film.
So popular, that there are modern “scooter” tours in Italy.
That you’ve lived sheltered parochial lives is not doubted.
That real scooters, not the expensive little toys, are known as scooters around the world, including the USA is obvious.
1) The important part of the story is that it’s bursting into flames
2) yes, it is considered a scooter. I know it’s hard to tell from the video (you have to be watching closely), the legs of the guy sitting in front are initially together in front of him (behind the steering column) and not out on the sides (like the back passengers legs are) until he swings them out near the beginning of the video. On a bike (electric or otherwise) the legs would always be out on the sides of the bike.
scooter [ˈsko͞odər]
NOUN
I’m assuming you are thinking of definition #2 of Scooter. What is in the video fits definition #1.
I think it’s dimensia Joe’s scooter!!
It is truly ironic that the chemical hating greens should adopt chemical energy for all cars, trucks and buses. EVs may get regulated to death the was nuclear has been except this time the fear is justified.
It’s more ironic that crazy climate deniers think they will freeze to death if we switch to unreliables .
These busses are proof that there is enough heat as long as there are some lithium batteries around (Even empty ones can end up in an amazing fire while conventional engines can’t.That’s how superior battery vehicles are)
+ these batteries are smart-batteries, they can set themselves on fire without any human assistance.That’s real progress(ivism)
There may be some health issues and toxic waste and your lunges may collapse but everything is fine as no co2 is being released and that’s what life is all about..
No worries if all liability is waived away.
Pay no attention to that Liability behind the curtain
I see what you did there…well played.
Unfortunately there is a huge amount of CO2 being emitted from a burning battery pack, along with the toxic fumes.
Whence comes the CO2? Not from the battery.
The batteries contain many different chemicals and substances and as a result emit various gases
Toxic fluoride gas emissions from lithium-ion battery fires | Scientific Reports (nature.com)
“Li-ion batteries release a various number of toxic substances as well as e.g. CO (an asphyxiant gas) and CO2 (induces anoxia) during heating and fire. At elevated temperature the fluorine content of the electrolyte and, to some extent, other parts of the battery such as the polyvinylidene fluoride (PVdF) binder in the electrodes, may form gases such as hydrogen fluoride HF, phosphorus pentafluoride (PF5) and phosphoryl fluoride (POF3). Compounds containing fluorine can also be present as e.g. flame retardants in electrolyte and/or separator, in additives and in the electrode materials, e.g. fluorophosphates, adding additional sources of fluorine.”
https://www.nasa.gov/sites/default/files/atoms/files/nabw20_fire_gas_char_studies_liion_cells_batt_djuarez-robles.pdf
“lithium-based rechargeable cells can emit gases which may be harmful to humans and/or may form a combustible mixture in sufficient concentrations. Examples may include, but are not limited to, carbon monoxide (CO), carbon dioxide (CO2 ), hydrogen (H2 ), organic solvent vapors and hydrogen fluoride (HF)”
Absolutely. Most of the fire comes from the organic solvents used as an ion transport mechanism. That stuff is loads of carbon cooking off with their own internal oxidizer. CO2, CO and then all the Lithium and Nitrogen compounds – the smoke is a veritable lethal smorgasbord!
A pleasure to hear some people have some knowledge rather than all the other Facebook using millennials going yap, yap, yap about whether it is a bike or a scooter.
LOL the snark is strong is this one 🙂
Well, until we get the Mr. Fusion working, all vehicles are going to be powered by chemical energy one way or another.
The thought of a Tesla catching fire in a multistory parking garage brings up old disaster movies.
Especially if the garage is in a tall office building or apartment complex, full of people. Think Towering Inferno.
“Especially if the garage is in a tall office building or apartment complex, full of people.”
And cars full of gasoline.
If the garage was full of EV’s, the result would be much worse.
Yes, the Fire Department would just have to stand back and let everything burn.
They may surely pay attention nothing other start burning, wouldn’t they ? 😀
“We’ve sent men to the Moon”, surely we can develop a material to put out lithium – ion battery fires.
Sure…eventually. But, for the time being, the recipe for that material is; One part H2O and one part ‘time’. The exact amount of each ingredient for this recipe depends upon how large the burning, lithium-ion, battery is. H2O can be replaced by silica sand under the right conditions; mostly where containment is more important than, immediate, suppression and the burning battery is, readily, accessible to be buried until it has burned out.
Not sure if I should put a /sarc tag here.
Max P
yeah … its called sand …
Big problem is that these batteries seem to be at least somewhat self-oxidizing. But a good thick coat of concrete might do it.
Like the Russians did at Chernobyl?? How much stuff do you think they can carry on a fire engine?
Can you imagine what would happen if they tried the same solution as in The Towering Inferno?
Given that the EVs would probably all be together for charging purposes, I’d imagine that if one immolated, they all would, just like the 15 buses in the story.
Given that most EVs these days are connected to the internet, I also imagine that hackers could potentially start a fire in at least one EV in a bunch*.
(*what is the collective noun for EVs? A virtue of EVs, perhaps? A bomb of EVs?)
Immolation?
If several crows together are a murder, several EVs together should be called an arson.
Gasoline and diesel vehicles do not spontaneously combust. The same cannot be said of battery vehicles.
A short in the wiring of a parked (or running) vehicle will start a fire, but that’s not the fuel spontaneously combusting. EVs will also have a lot more wiring to go wrong.
The Green Towering Inferno: Return to Reality
Think 911
and I am thinking of long vehicular tunnels…
A long, narrow, confined space under water, and an accident involving an electric vehicle. What could possibly go wrong?
In 2008 and 2015 lorries caught fire in the Channel Tunnel
The fires caused no end of trouble.
So European parking lots will become as expansive as those in the U.S.
But where? We need the space for solar panels and windmills….
Did you mean “explosive” rather than “expansive”?
both
Lithium? Reminds me of white phosphorus. Don’t bother putting water on it.
Jeez, I just looked up at the TV and Barack Hussein Obama is telling stories at COP26. Maybe someone could drop some lithium on me?
I believe lithium is very effective in treating schizophrenia.
I thought that was cyanide..
Only one dose required, ’tis true, but the patient is more likely to survive.
Lithium is used predominantly for bipolar. It is not an anti-psychotic.
Was he telling the story about winning a peace prize while bombing brown people in the Middle East?
That one was a doozy.
in my high school freshman science class, in ’64 – the teacher dropped a pellet of lithium into a glass of water- it flamed up to the ceiling and left a black mark on the asbestos (?) ceiling- he didn’t return the next year
I think that was more likely to have been sodium or potassium.
I taught chemistry for 30 years. I loved to drop lithium, sodium, and potassium into water. These three metals can be used to demonstrate progressive reactivity of elements on the periodic table. Chemistry students can be entertained and taught at the same time. They loved when an explosion occurred during any demo. But…this demo required safety procedures to be in place. If I were teaching today I would follow up with all of the ev fires online.
PCSMAZINTL
My chem teacher lost 2 or 3 fingers in one of his shows .
Turned him into an angry bastard.
I saw the effects of “Willie Peter” on the human body in Vietnam.
The transition from horses to internal combustion (or steam) power was not smooth and trouble-free either.
You think there actually will be a transition to EV?
Dream on
Eventually I think that there will be, after a few minor problems have been sorted out…
Yeah, like once the need for the average person to have a vehicle is sorted out.
A defect in a single cell in a lithium ion battery pack can ignite and cause a cascade failure and major fire. A Tesla battery pack has nearly 7,000 cells connected in series/parallel to produce the required voltage and current. There’s no such thing as 100% reliability. It’s actually quite impressive that the quality control is good enough to keep the majority of electric vehicles from burning up.
And laptops, and mobiles.
There’s also a matter of scale. A laptop battery only has around 12 cells, a Tesla batter has 7,000.
And aircraft? They are talking about replacing passenger jets with electric power. Lordy me!
How about this ‘minor’ problem ?
There are currently about 1.4 billion cars in the world and by 2050 it is expected there will be 2 billion. Very few of them are currently BEVs or PHEVs (10.2m at the end of 2020 according to the International Energy Agency) The IEA also predicts on their best scenario that there will be c. 72m EVs by 2040 – still a drop in the ocean. Even if the IEA is out by a factor of ten (unlikely) there will still be almost twice as many non EV cars in the world.
And then there are all the Heavy Goods and Light Goods vehicles.
We already abandoned electric vehicles because they were not great. And those EVs were safer than today’s. Plus they had battery exchange services, dead for fully-charged ones.
Studebaker’s first car model in 1910 was an electric.
And then a Mr Henry Ford produced his Model T ICEV and the free enterprise, free market consumers made that car king of the roads.
You cannot carry cans of electricity to drive where there are no recharging stations, but the Ford Model T did.
Another problem with EVs is charging. Not necessarily the exorbitant time required to charge, but the number of charging stations that would be required in an average city. If every person had an EV, then every garage, or household, plus various city owned structures, apartment blocks, stores, airports, malls, etc would have dozens or hundreds each. You could be looking at 50,000 chargers in an average city. The amount of electronics to keep all this unreliable charging going on would certainly keep the wheels of industry churning forever. If a few percent of these units die every year, that will ensure no one will ever again be buy a playstation of xbox or TV or EV just to supply chips for all the vast number of replacement chargers, lol.
It’s possible but not likely. As long as they have the lithium ion batteries in them, they’ll never be fit for purpose. The first person to come up with a lightweight, long-range, and above all safe, battery for these things is likely to make a fortune but I shan’t hold my breath.
BEV’s have been around for well over 100 years. It’s a long time to hold one’s breath.
And there are so many of them on the road, in practical use.
As a percentage of the total number of cars on the road, “so many” is a quite a stretch.
As for practical, for a few people they might be. If it weren’t for the subsidies, both in purchase price and road use taxes, there would be a lot fewer.
Did he really need to add a \sarc tag? 🙂
But “… a lightweight, long-range, and above all safe, battery …” certainly has not been around for “well over 100 years.”
And that is precisely why I shan’t be. After all that time they still haven’t figured out the problem with the batteries and probably won’t in the next 100 years either.
Yes, by now they should have succeeded after all that time, consumers instead favoured ICEV.
The customers are always right you know.
We need micro-scale thorium salt reactors in every car. Think a crash is bad now? Think of the contamination from a tractor trailer spilling its fuel in that case. Of course like fusion, they’ll always be 10 years away.
Of course my internal image of such a vehicle is a little steam punkish – a little 10kg thorium module heats molten salt which generates steam for the steam engine. When power is removed from the module it quits reacting. So as long as the container is built tough enough, a crash would just mean the reactor would shut down. Though leaking molten salt and steam could be a real killer!
I don’t think it’d be a practical idea with cars but trains, now there’s an idea…..
And fill up with water periodically just like the old railroad system.
Return of the old whistle stop?
What were these mostly imagined troubles?
Electric cars have been around for at least as long as ICE engines. ICE won.
“A Lot Of People Don’t Know That”.
Drop into a general conversation the fact that EVs preceded ICE vehicles and enjoy the reactions.
“Electric cars have been around for at least as long as ICE engines. ICE won.”
Longer. Electric cars came first.
There were a number of years when horses continued to outnumber gasoline powered vehicles. Gasoline won.
Because it was demonstrably better.
Because cars beat out horses, therefore electric will beat out ICE?
If that’s really the best you can do, you should apologize to the class for wasting our time.
Much longer, the first electric vehicle was made in 1838. It failed!
And don’t forget that steam vehicles were the third horse in the race.
Speed,
There was a trouble free transition from steam and from electric vehicles that began as soon as the internal combustion engine was invented.
Richard
All the issues with EV’s with our currently technology are known. The motors are pretty mature.. with the real remaining issue will be enough raw materials to manufacture them in high volume (especially rare earth elements).
If Li based batteries could be charged faster, wouldn’t be such a fire hazard and we had enough raw materials to manufacture tens of millions of packs a year without creating an environmental disaster, they would work. Unfortunately what we have currently isn’t the be all, end all solution and won’t be. We need something different and there isn’t really anything on the horizon to replace Li based batteries.
The last thing is supplying the enormous amounts of electricity to power all these anticipated vehicles. Renewables won’t do it on a mass scale 24x7x365. Nuclear is the only long term answer and it is at least a decade away (if that).
I think if EV’s were cost effective they’d be a great solution. I actually went and bought a plug a month ago to be my drive around town car and a backup if the loonies get in true control. But I won’t take it on a trip.
Short of room temperature super conductors, there are no more improvements that are possible with the electric motor.
There are a lot of things that can be done, with current technology, that would make ICE better. They aren’t being done because few people are willing to pay the price for those advancements.
The motors themselves aren’t the problem, they’re fairly good, efficient and do the job. It’s the batteries that are the problem. Once you’ve solved the fire hazard problem you’ve still got the problems of low range, long recharge times and huge weights of batteries.
Obviously the solution is anti-matter.
MarkW: Now, that’s just silly. If such a vehicle were hit by a photon torpedo, “the ship can’t take it, captain!” (you have to imagine a scot saying that).
Don’t forget battery energy density! Its about 40 to 1 in favour of ICE vehicles.
No surprise that the first-generation battery-powered motor vehicles (horseless carriages) were dubbed “Town Cars”.
One would hope that we learned from those experiences. But, yet again, neither steam engines, steam locomotives or IC vehicles spontaneously combust.
Any battery system will be faced with the fact that enormous amounts of energy are aggregated and subject to release in a single-failure mode. ICE requires fuel, oxygen and spark all at the same time.
The transition was made by individuals making their own investment and use decisions. With a series of Five-Year-Plans, we’d be ass deep in horse shit.
How much did it cost?
Maybe not. But it was voluntary and needed no subsidies.
There really is a safe reliable electric bus technology that has been around for most of a century. It is busses powered by overhead trolley wires. It is still being used in San Francisco. But the warmunists are so besotted with Li Ion Batteries that they don’t even think about it.
Last time I was in San Francisco, the trolleys were not functioning properly. Largely an expensive tourist attraction these days. They ended up dropping us off next to some warehouse, waiting in a large crowd for a regular bus that never came. We eventually had to walk all the way across town (taxis have to be called – can’t just hail one).
However, some cities are using a similar concept with more modern-looking busses with long poles attaching to a wire that charges the bus battery as it goes. The best part about this system is that it’s mostly paid for by the government. They say they’re “working” on the overheating battery problem. This system should become more economical than a diesel bus at about the exact time diesel fuel is outlawed.
When diesel fuel is outlawed, only outlaws will have diesel fuel.
I have a diesel truck with about an 700 mile range, unloaded. I can add an auxiliary tank and double the range. Let the cops in their EV squad cars and their electric helicopters chase me down. I don’t have to outrun them. I just have to outlast them. 😜
Some miscreant here in Southern Calirofnia try to outlast the police cars and helos in a chase, only to find out that the police just hand off the chase to the next jurisdiction. The miscreant never outruns or outlasts the police.
Indeed, you might outlast the first police car that spotted you, but they’ll have long since called in backup along the way. A guy I went to school with ended up trying to out run from the police (for some stupid traffic violation) when he was a young driver. He ended up leading a half-dozen cop cars to his home. D’oh.
Even the fastest Ferrari, can’t outrun a radio.
Yup. We had a saying w-a-a-a-y back in H.S.:
“You can outrun the man, but you can’t outrun the radio.”
Well aware of that when I wrote the above, but I’m sure you caught the winky.
That one was written for the imagery; the “lengths” 😜 the cops will have to go to for Possession of Diesel Fuel. “Oops! Ran the battery down to zero. It’s a brick now, Fred. Damn those diesels!”
Then there was the guy who stole the Tesla. …
Now that was funny right there, I don’t care who you are.
🤣 🤣
Did you dodge any human poop while in SF or did you use the cities app for avoiding it?
“There really is a safe reliable electric bus technology that has been around for most of a century. It is busses powered by overhead trolley wires.”
Yes, and they work just fine and you don’t have to worry about them causing unstoppable fires.
I remember the electric buses running in Winnipeg when I was young. Sometimes they would throw some impressive sparks from the connections to the overhead wires. I think they switched to internal combustion just to eliminate the overhead wires.
Probably to make the leftist estheticians happy.
Those electric buses were called Trackless Trolleys in Philadelphia, PA. When I was young there were regular trolleys and their tracks all over the city then the trackless ones started to appear and eventually all the tracks were torn up. Finally the overhead wires were removed and all the buses were diesel and could drive anywhere. Riding over the tracks in the streets was always dicey, your tires could get caught, skewing the vehicle around.
This story was posted because it involved battery-powered electric busses. Let us not forget that petroleum powered busses burn too.
https://www.croydonadvertiser.co.uk/news/croydon-news/live-orpington-bus-garage-fire-2246043
Combustible or spontaneous combustion?
On the one hand, firefighters are able to try stopping the fire, not posssible with EV,
second hand, reason wasn’t fuel, but the air condition unit that started burning.
@Speed PS
AC units “like” burnig, when the compressor was running hot, mostly a question of missing, defect ventilation / cooling of the compressor. That’s why a burning AC has nothing to do where it’s installed, car, house, what ever.
So, why didn’t you read the article before linking to a non compatible story ?
“second hand, reason wasn’t fuel, but the air condition unit that started burning.”
The poster didn’t mention that. That would put a whole new light on the subject, wouldn’t it. I guess that’s why it wasn’t mentioned.
It was mentioned in the linked article.
Nowhere near as often. Gasoline fires can be put out. Lithium fires can’t.
One more time, with vigor – fossil-fuel fires can be put out, lithium fires can’t.
A little way down in your link, it seems the start of the fire on the first bus was electrical. Not confirmed, but it’s believed that the fire was started by a fault in an air conditioner on top of the bus.
I’m guessing that either Speed didn’t actually read the story he posted (Is Speed related to griff?), or he doesn’t believe AC’s on electric busses can catch fire.
Speed, the website you linked states: “this website understands the blaze was started by an air conditioning unit on top of one of the buses. This is yet to be confirmed.”
and ” …it just after 3.30am, and the fire was under control at 6.31am.”
So what (in a garage) the towns bus’s rooftop AC unit would be doing at 3.30 am ? Was it battery powered? If so what kind of batteries? Lithium?
Could have been some kind of electrical fault.
Burning air conditioning units will burn wherever they are, this one just happened to be attached to a bus.
“The 3:00am blaze …. An insurance report says a lithium battery in a charging drill overheated and caught alight”
If you have one of those battery powered vacuum cleaners or any other tools which might have lithium battery, do not leave on charge overnight or if no one is present in the house.
https://www.abc.net.au/news/2021-10-16/broome-house-fire-prompts-lithium-battery-warning/100544902
” … do not leave on charge overnight … ”
If you have one of those battery powered vacuum cleaners or any other tools which might have lithium battery, better to throw it away!
Start with your phone 😀
Can’t wait until The US Forest Service has one of the E-150s
light off in a nice, dry patch of timber…
No doubt they would try to blame the subsequent fire on global warming.
Maybe the current fleet of EVs can be shipped off to England and burned in Drax! If they can take the heat, that is!
We should try to maximize the glorious, Green technologies wherever they fit best; preferably in a large, open pit away from the water table somewhere!
Li+ reactors.
Is it possible to extinguish burning lithium? Of course it is. All you need is liquid nitrogen fire extinguishers. link I wonder how many hundreds of gallons of liquid nitrogen it would take to extinguish a burning Tesla. My inner twelve year-old really really wants to try the experiment.
Shhh… commieBob. Don’t let that get out. Some bureaucrat somewhere will think that’s brilliant.
Then, not only will we be paying for unreliables and subsiding EVs, but we’ll be taxed up to our eyeballs so every fire department can have a liquid nitrogen firetruck.
Government doesn’t solve problems. They create problems and then apply the wrong solutions, said solutions creating more problems which require more headcount to come up with new problems, and on and on it goes.
Hmm. Liquid nitrogen plus a lot of HEAT. That sounds like violently expanding GAS ( better known as an explosion).
I am pretty sure insurance firms are busily rewriting liability. Park garages might be liable, and house-owners should check nearby parked EV’s, especially holiday apartments parking.
Maybe EV Safe-Zones will appear – elecro-Wokeness? Has to happen….
And why don’t EV manufacturers include one of these in the trunk/boot?
https://youtu.be/yO8cVWOqZcg
It’s still in tests ?
I came out of a store about a week ago and found that a Chevy Bolt had parked right next to me, ignoring GM’s advice to park at least 50 feet away from anything. Scared me, and I got out of there fast!
If any vehicle parked next to you had a fire, once their tires light up any adjacent vehicle would ignite from the heat. If it makes you feel any better.
If it’s not an electric, there is almost no chance that it will spontaneously combust. The makers of several electric cars are telling their customers to make sure they don’t park close to anything combustible.
There are no makers of ICE cars doing the same.
At least when the old presenters of Top Gear where doing silly things with vehicles we knew from the start that it was not going to work and be entertaining to watch.
They were also right in calling people who believed in global warming econuts and viewed it as a sickness.
But unfortunately the loonies have taken over the asylum and we’re all suffering.
James Bull
The Clean Syndrome, starring Renewable Regret.
But electric cars are so much CLEANER and GREENER than a fossil fuel car… Let’s create a mandate that everyone must purchase only electric vehicles to save us all from climate!
(I wonder how many tons of pollutants and CO2 a burning electric bus adds into the atmosphere?)
Burning tires release lots of pollutants. Ban tires, just run on rims. I’m sure the resulting sparks won’t start any fires.
What is the point when the electricity grid is supplied mostly from fossil fuelled generators?
There is a God yanno, one with a sense of humour and, with ‘humour, ‘Timing is everything‘
Ta-dahhhhhh, enter from stage left: Auntie Beeb sometime earlier today.
(She can get some things right. Notta lot but ‘some‘ and better than the Grauniad tha’s fo’sure)
Headline:”How the humble battery can help save the world”
Its one of their ‘video stories‘ – here’s hoping it shows for everyone
The real killer, as we recognise from images in the story here, is the word ‘humble‘
‘Passengers evacuated after e-Scooter ‘explodes’ on Parsons Green tubeIn shocking footage, sent to The Standard, clouds of smoke billow down the District Line tube as the flaming scooter is dragged on to the platform at 8pm on Monday night.
Passengers flee and can be heard coughing and spluttering from smoke inhalation after the lithium battery of the device exploded at the front of the carriage.’
https://www.standard.co.uk/news/london/escooter-explosion-parsons-green-tube-london-underground-b964083.html
There is literally nothing these green f-ing clowns can get right.
They should be called the green menace or green terrorists
At least it will be a green cremation on the way to the health food store.
I think they only catch fire once…
I think they catch fire consecutively….
The trouble is that vehicles on roads go through rather a lot of vibrations and shocks. Lead-acid batteries and their like have no problems with that, there is a liquid between the electrodes and such vibrations cause no internal damage. Now lithium-iron batteries its a different matter depending on construction. See https://journals.sagepub.com/doi/full/10.1177/14613484211008112 for more information.
In essence, cylinder based lithium-iron batteries suffer from damage due to vibrations. Which probably leads to major failures over time. Until this is fixed, no EV based on cylinder based lithium-iron batteries should be considered as safe as ICE
Ouch! They’ll never be any good for off-road driving, then. I recently took a trip up to the northern tip of Australia, with thousands of km of dirt roads. The corrugations can really smash a vehicle about, even at 80kph. So much so that my lead-acid battery started failing after I returned. It was 9 years old, though. An EV would probably have self-combusted.
Petrol and diesel vehicles regularly go up in flames, should we be concerned?
No. Petrol and Diesel vehicles very rarely go up in flames as a result of the fuel source (despite what Hollywood would have you believe), electrical systems on ICE cars occasionally spark a fire but can be controlled easily. EV’s are 3-10 times more likely to have a fire, dependant on age, frequency of use, bumps or knocks, etc.
I find we can usually put them out alright, except of course for the tires, catalytic converters and sometimes if there is a lot of fuel. Then you may need foam to smother the fuel on fire.
Haven’t had to put out an EV fire yet, and hope I never have the opportunity; or to cut one apart to remove trapped occupants.
Speaking of which, it’s started already..
Prices for battery grade lithium carbonate have gone up 300 per cent in the last year, reaching $28,765, while prices for nickel and cobalt have registered a 62.4 per cent growth year-on-year. Lithium supply shortages are also to blame for the price surge, as experts believe they will continue in the next few years.
Rising costs of lithium batteries to cause a hike in EV prices (msn.com)
Park your EV in the driveway, away from the house and run a lead out for safer overnight charging.
And get the lead stolen for the copper?
If I was a high wealth individual investor or director on the board of a motor vehicle manufacturing business or similar and the global market for ICEV was highly competitive and profit margins were shrinking I would recommend a transition to EV, the potential profits from replacing the ICEV fleet with EV, providing recharging infrastructure after removing liquid fuel distribution facilities, recycling ICEV traded in for scrap value and other new for profit business opportunities.
Of course I would also lobby governments to legislate for ICEV removal from the roads to force the consumers to transition.
I would even consider selling part of my shareholding in renewable energy to invest in EV transition and related opportunities.
We no longer need Battery Electric transit buses. The original justification for Battery Electric buses was for their zero pollution attributes (PM, NOx, reduced toxicity), and latter CO2 reductions.
Since 2007 all diesels sold in USA are equipped with diesel soot filters. The cleanest diesels are 103% effective reducing PM, HC and CO pollution in air violation areas.They clean air violation air as they drive. Using bio and renewable diesels provides greater CO2 reductions than Battery Electric vehicles for most power generation modes used today in California.
Unfortunately, CARB’s clean air policy is preventing clean air progress, CARB is too invested in ZEVs that they lost sight of their core job. Per the Clean Air Act their job is to reduce air violations. Believe it or not Battery Electric vehicles do not provide air quality violation mitigation.
The core problem is lithium, which is often used in tranquilizers. The batteries become tranquil, they get careless, they let heat build up and then they burst into flames. The batteries would be better made of sodium, although then they’d be subject to high blood pressure.
All this is confusing. Why does everything have to be so complicated? It used to be fun being ignorant and stupid, but now everybody is getting on my case about it. Why are smart people so mean?
Burn baby, burn!
So the only place that does electric buses right is Chattanooga, TN? They’ve run an electric shuttle bus service since the early 1990’s. Aside from the initial federal grant to start the program, it’s been funded by donations and a cut from downtown parking fees. Riding it on the loop between the downtown station and the old railroad yard, and from the station across the river, is free – though there are donation boxes on the buses and at the stations. AFAIK they haven’t had any catch fire. Their first buses used lead-acid battery packs and they had a fast swap facility at the railroad yard station. They couldn’t run all day and charging took too long. Their next buses had NiMH batteries that held enough charge to run almost all day and could top off enough charge fast enough to finish a day so they stopped doing battery swaps. When I went to Chattanooga a few years ago they were getting their third series buses with Lithium-Ion batteries. Those could run a full day without needing any recharging. Wouldn’t be surprised if they’re looking at Lithium-Iron-Phosphate now. That technology can be run down to nearly zero % charge without damaging the batteries, unlike Lead-Acid, NiMH, or Lithium-Ion. It doesn’t matter that the energy density is less, compared to Lead-Acid, a 100 amp-hour Li-Fe-PO4 is equivalent capacity to a 200 amp-hour lead-acid that can only be safely drawn down to 50%. Li-Fe-PO4 also weighs less than other battery types, so that also works to improve vehicle range.
If you have a 1st, 2nd, or 3rd generation Toyota Prius (ignoring that the actual 1st gen was only sold in Japan) there’s a company that has developed a Li-Fe-PO4 replacement for the NiMH battery. It holds more energy than the original battery and includes electronic controls that trick the car into charging it up more and drawing it down more so it can rely more on the battery than the engine at lower speeds. With the original NiMH battery it only charges up to about 90% of maximum capacity and won’t discharge below the safe voltage for that chemistry.
If that’s the CARTA bus service, they had a bus fire in 2020.
I know nothing about battery chemistry, but I know that the Chinese company BYD claims LiFePO4 batteries don’t catch fire the way lithium-ion batteries do. They started using BYD city buses in Indianapolis two years ago.
I know nothing about battery chemistry, but I heard that the Chinese company BYD claims LiFePO4 batteries don’t catch fire the way lithium-ion batteries do. The Indianapolis city-bus company started using BYD buses two years ago. I haven’t heard of any fires yet–but that doesn’t mean they’ve had none.
When an electric vehicles starts smoking – RUN!
Battery tech is moving on/will move on.
We have refined ICE over 150 years.
EV battery tech, what 15 years (to any real degree)? (Tesla started 2006)
What is out there (EV batteries) now WONT be there in 20 or even 10 years time…..
This is one that deals with the fire risk ….
It’s Chinese and backed by Warren Buffett.
So it wont fail …. the chinese will see to that.
https://www.cnbc.com/2021/03/01/buffett-owns-more-of-chinese-electric-car-maker-byd-than-general-motors.html
The Search For The Magic Battery continues…
“Going Green” will burn you every time!