Essay by Eric Worrall
A few years ago I called 2021 the year the EVs burned. But a quick review of last year’s horror show of EV fire incidents suggests my assessment may have been premature.
EV fires remind industry of associated risk
By Teresa Moss on January 5, 2024
InsuranceElectric vehicles (EVs) appear to have caused multiple fires at manufacturing factories in recent months, sparking a reminder about EV safety.
Most recently, the Detroit Fire Department responded to a three-alarm fire involving lithium-ion batteries at General Motors’ Factory Zero last month, according to Detroit Free Press.
“Our initial investigation indicates a forklift accidentally punctured a container with battery materials, causing the fire,” Tara Stewart Kuhnen, GM spokeswoman, said in an email Wednesday.
The newspaper also reported another fire at the property in October that involved an autonomous electric car. It states the fire department’s report mentions a battery fire.
However, Kuhnen told the newspaper that a non-battery-related component caused the second fire.
Outside Detroit, the Auburn Hills Fire Department responded to a November fire at Chrysler’s Tech Center.
Multiple media reports say Chrysler’s fire involved an EV as well.
…
Read more: https://www.repairerdrivennews.com/2024/01/05/ev-fires-remind-industry-of-associated-risk/
There have been a lot of articles about EV fires in 2023;
‘Massive Problem’: Sky News host criticises sudden EV fires
Model 3 catches fire near Goulburn, as discarded MG battery destroys five cars at airport
Incident at Chinese EV battery plant: Fire during test run sparks safety fears
Electric Vehicle Catches Fire in Middle of The Road, Causing Traffic Jam
7 Battery Electric Cars a Day Catch Fire in China: The Most Involved Brands
Four die in Volkswagen EV fire after crash, fueling safety debate
Why electric vehicles are being written off over minor battery damage
…
There are a lot more where they came from.
Defenders of EVs claim gasoline vehicle fires are far more likely, though given a lot of gasoline vehicles on the road are quite old, I’m not sure they are comparing like for like;
Do electric cars pose a greater fire risk than petrol or diesel vehicles?
The first in a series exploring the myths and realities surrounding EVs
Jasper Jolly @jjpjollyMon 20 Nov 2023 17.00 AEDT
When a fire ripped through a car park at Luton airport last month it set off a round of speculation that an electric vehicle was to blame. The theory was quickly doused by the Bedfordshire fire service, which said the blaze appeared to have started in a diesel car.
Yet the rumour refused to be quelled, spreading on social media like, well, wildfire. Even when these stories are patiently debunked, they come back as zombie myths that refuse to die.
Electric vehicles (EVs) will not deliver the environment from damage but international climate forecasters agree they are a crucial part of the transition from fossil fuels. The Guardian has spoken to experts and looked for hard data where possible to address some of the most common criticisms of electric vehicles.
…
“All the data shows that EVs are just much, much less likely to set on fire than their petrol equivalent,” said Colin Walker, the head of transport at the Energy and Climate Intelligence Unit thinktank. “The many, many fires that you have for petrol or diesel cars just aren’t reported.”
…
Read more: https://www.theguardian.com/business/2023/nov/20/do-electric-cars-pose-a-greater-fire-risk-than-petrol-or-diesel-vehicles
On the other hand, EV and gasoline fires are not equal. The Australian maritime authority in 2023 warned ferries about the danger of EVs.
DCV Safety Alert 02/2023 – Risks Associated with the Carriage of Battery Electric Vehicles
This safety alert aims to raise awareness of the risks involved with the carriage of battery-powered electric vehicles (BEVs) on roll-on, roll-off (RORO) ferries.
Purpose
This safety alert provides guidance to operators of domestic commercial vessels (DCVs) on risks associated with the carriage of battery-powered electric vehicles (BEVs) on roll-on, roll-off (RORO) ferries, and how best to deal with these risks.
Risk assessment
As per Marine Order 504 (Certificates of operation and operation requirements) you must conduct a risk assessment for your vessel to ensure that risks arising from the carriage of BEVs are addressed.
Consideration must be given to the hazards arising from transporting BEVs and a vessel specific procedure developed for the prevention and mitigation of fire incidents involving BEVs.
New risks identified in relation to BEVs
Some risks associated with BEV fires onboard DCVs include:
- High voltage shocks
- Direct jet flames
- Fires develop in intensity quickly and rapidly reach their maximum intensity (typically within 2-3 minutes)
- Toxic gases
- Gas explosion (if the released gas accumulates for a while before being ignited)
- Long lasting re-ignition risk (can ignite or re-ignite weeks, or maybe months after the provoking incident)
- Once established fires are difficult to stop/extinguish
- Thermal runaway
…
Read more: https://www.amsa.gov.au/vessels-operators/domestic-commercial-vessels/dcv-safety-alert-022023-risks-associated-carriage
EVs seem to pose a particular problem for ships. Ships have been destroyed by uncontrollable EV fires – automatic fire suppression systems which work on gasoline and diesel fires are helpless to extinguish EV fires, as the Felicity Ace discovered in 2022.
The Genius Star XI fire lithium battery fire was somehow brought under control in the last week, the ship is currently anchored near Dutch Harbour, Alaska, though the ship is still subject to a one mile safety exclusion zone.
I once survived a vehicle fire, caused by a gasoline tank leak. The vehicle was a write-off, but the intensity of the fire was nothing like some of the EV fires we’ve seen. I was first alerted to the fire by other drivers, I had time to pull over, and after I pulled over I had a good 90 seconds to get out of the vehicle before the cabin started filling with smoke. It wasn’t obvious the vehicle would be a write-off until the fire had been burning for 5 minutes, and the intensity finally grew to the point it was obvious the vehicle would be destroyed. Even so, I retrieved an old plastic Apple MacBook from the trunk of the vehicle. After drying the laptop for a few months, I managed to get it to boot long enough to rescue files I hadn’t backed up (lesson learned).
To be fair, the laptop may have been protected a little by some bottled water we had in the trunk, but I doubt a few bottles of water would have saved my laptop from an EV fire.
Compare this experience to a small electric vehicle fire. Bear in mind the battery on this electric scooter is minuscule compared to the battery on a full size electric automobile.
You don’t need a collision or impact to damage EV batteries. A hard frost can permanently damage an EV battery, though I have no data on whether frost damage is as dangerous in terms of fire risk as collision damage.
Are EVs more dangerous than gasoline vehicles? Despite my personal experience of a gasoline vehicle fire, I believe the answer is yes, given the maritime authority warning, the speed and ferocity of EV fires, the writing off of EVs after even minor collisions, and the apparent inability of normal fire suppression systems to douse EV fires – even if claims that gasoline fires are more common are true.
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That’s the issue.
Yep
Then there’s this…
So all those Petrol/Diesel auto fires are now obviously modeled fire DATA (fictitious). Since they “aren’t reported”, the fires must be made up for the paper…they’re certainly aren’t any reports about ALL THOSE FIRES.
Good catch, hadn’t thought of that. How can one know about unreported fires?
Ha ha ha ha ha ha!
Hmmm, I must be having a dull day, as that’s my first chuckle of the day (-:
Oh, that’s easy, just use your …..
You could probably get information from auto insurance companies, but then those fires wouldn’t be “unreported”. Bigger question is how many of these unreported fires started while the auto was just sitting there.
None. A petrol car has to be driving or just recently turned off. It is impossible to self combust like an Ev. Remember why hoverboards got banned from airplanes.
All safety agencies collect such data from accident reports. In the US that is USDOT, collecting data from all 50 state DOTs. Insurance company claims also track the data.
There is no lack of data … only ignorance of the data by those who claim EVs are more commonly consumed by fire than ICVs, which is patently untrue.
But EVs are consumed by Spontaneous Combustion far more often than Internal combustion engines. Those Require accidents to rupture fuel tanks or fuel lines. The only thing that.will cause a petrol engine to spontaneously combust is a short in the electrical system
how many garages/houses/ships have petrol cars burned down ?
Excellent question.
ICE car fires are, more often than not, the result of theft, vandalism or a crash. Self combustion is rare and is, more often than not a result of non, or bad maintenance of older vehicles.
The fuel of a DERV (Diesel Engined Road Vehicle) is almost impossible to ignite by conventional methods (lighting with a match, short circuit etc.).
Petrol vehicles are also surprisingly difficult to set alight, even ruptured fuel lines are inclined to self extinguish unless the cars fuel pump continues to run.
The problem isn’t the fuel igniting, it’s mostly down to fire sustaining materials like underbody plastics, oily and dirty engine compartments, paint, and materials such as sound deadening, rubber, and the internal materials of the vehicle.
They are also easy to extinguish by the fire services using limited amounts of water.
EV’s have all these problems, other than fuel, but the batteries sustain fire themselves and thermal runaway means they cannot be extinguished by conventional means and they burn at much higher temperatures. They are also subject to violent explosions as the battery cells short out or overheat.
I once witnessed a vehicle on fire, there were flames coming out from under it and everything, it was so on fire I called 911, reported the vehicle fire. After I hung up, the driver of said “burning vehicle” got into his car, started it, and backed up, leaving the fire burning on the ground where he had been sitting. At that point I concluded a garbage bag or something similar (looked like more fire than a single garbage bag) had caught on his undercarriage, contacted the hot exhaust pipe and ignited. Once he stopped, the material melted and softened enough it fell off of whatever protrusion it had snagged on. When the driver saw the success of his maneuver, he drove away. By the time a fire truck arrived, all flammable materials had been consumed, there was only a scorch mark and some ashes on the shoulder.
I have been to a couple of commercial garage fires. The buildings engulfed in flames and when extinguished the cars being worked on, many of them in bits, were only damaged by denting and scorching from falling debris.
As I say elsewhere, people who know what they are doing, like car thief’s destroying evidence, usually torch the interior of the vehicle and leave the doors open to allow plenty of oxygen to circulate.
That will destroy most of the car but the fuel tanks inevitably survive, as does the fuel in them.
BAD ICE fires are going to run 1000-1500F, maybe a bit more – that’s what I would expect to encounter in a garage fire. 1500 is a bit hot but still not so hot that we can’t get close enough in full turnout gear to extinguish it.
EV fires will be over 3000F, which is too hot to approach even in turnout gear. And even if we could – for what purpose? Not like we can extinguish it.
I see Duane is still trying to push his many times refuted claims about EV fires.
BTW, the vehicle that caused the Luton fire was a diesel hybrid, not a diesel, and from the video, the fire started in the battery compartment.
https://www.driving.co.uk/car-clinic/are-electric-cars-more-likely-to-catch-fire-than-petrol-and-diesel-cars/
Already refuted. How many more times do you want me to prove you wrong?
OK Mark… So we can have an adult discussion… which part do you refute?
Oh look… Mark has run away again.
Because I don’t lurk here, breathlessly awaiting Simon’s next helping of drivel, poor simple accuses me of having run away.
Try getting a life, maybe you will find a way to start acting human.
Once again you show the world what a blow hard you are……Yawn… So Mark, what part of that article has been debunked? Simple question relating to a statement you made. Either you can defend it or you can’t. So what is it?
What part have I debunked. All of it. I’m not surprised that you don’t remember. You do have a hard time remembering anything that doesn’t support what you want to believe.
Just ignore the child and it’s insults.
I don’t know, it’s kind of fun having my own personal troll. Getting him to drool on himself is amusing in it’s own way.
Only, it’s an MSM publication, not scientific in any way.
Slimon is addicted to the fake news.
“Slimon is addicted to the fake news.”
Says the Gateway pundit man/boy
Idiot.
It really is sad how Simon actually seems to believe that he is sounding like an adult.
But not a surprise given that he has exhibited the same behavior for almost 3 years running up to now.
Once again you show the world what a blow hard you are……Yawn… So Mark, what part of that article has been debunked? Simple question relating to a statement you made. Either you can defend it or you can’t. So what is it?
“Simple question”
He probably thinks the question is silly.
He probably does, but most people think it reasonable to justify a position they take. I think it more he knows he has been caught spreading misinformation, so he goes to his plan “B” which is to hide under the blankets.
Take a look in the mirror, Simon.
I don’t know if you have noticed but I don’t tend to run away…. and I don’t deal in misinformation. Occasionally I get things wrong(not something commonly admitted here by people) but who doesn’t. Now do you agree with Mark that the ideas promoted in this article have already been debunked? If so, let’s hear you points so we can have an adult conversation?
https://www.driving.co.uk/car-clinic/are-electric-cars-more-likely-to-catch-fire-than-petrol-and-diesel-cars/
I don’t know if you have noticed but I don’t tend to run away
No, I have not noticed that, given that you have done so. What I have noticed is that you don’t hold yourself to the same standards you require of others.
And as you so often do, you now attempt to distract by employing a classic red herring fallacy. I was discussing your inconsistent application of your own standards, referring to the example you provided last week when you refused to back up your position.
Thank you for once again demonstrating your hypocrisy. See ya’ next time.
I’ll look forward to you being specific. I can’t deal with a “last week” comment unless you link to it.
You really don’t remember your “silly” comment? You should seek medical help for your memory problems, that’s quite concerning. It’s also far from the first time you have forgotten previous conversations.
I’m outta here.
and I don’t deal in misinformation
Now that’s hilarious. BTW, the problems with that article don’t go away just because you post it for a second or third time.
I see that Simon still defines mis-information as anything that goes against what his handlers tell him to believe.
Wow, I see you have finally mastered cut and paste.
Next we will work on the really difficult skills.
Blah blah blah… but no response to your false statement. What a sad individual you are.
So Duane, if there is all this data out there why don’t you point some out to us? Show us some data and some real numbers, or don’t you want us to know the truth?
There’s ignorance, then there is the deliberate mischaracterization of the data, that you are once again engaging in.
Car & Driver disagrees with you. They actually researched it. You were hoping none of us would check. (No, Millions of Cars Are Not Catching Fire Every Year (caranddriver.com))
Yup.
Head of transport at the Energy and Climate “Intelligence” Unit thinktank. As reported by the Grauniad.
Wow. I feel SO much safer reading that! Almost the definition of the unvarnished, absolute truth!
Except that there are no absolute truths, the number of fires depends on what supports The Narrative.
It isn’t a matter of being “reported”. In the US no statistics are kept on a number of factors that can be involved in car crashes. For example, if a dog or other animal was in the passenger compartment during a car wreck doesn’t make it into any database. While photos of beer and liquor bottles are taken and used as evidence in accidents where DUI may be a factor, no data is kept on cheeseburgers smashed against the dashboard or french fries scattered all over the floor. If using a cell phone is illegal for a driver why is it acceptable for him to be inhaling a double hamburger while he’s wheeling a couple of tons of plastic and metal down the freeway?
It’s not a matter of what isn’t reported, it’s a matter of knowing unreported things.
Try quantifying the unknown
Well, General, in GB it is illegal to eat or drink while driving.
Would it be OK to breath? I mean all that CO2!!!!!
No it’s not.
It can be considered that you are not in control of your vehicle whilst eating/drinking but Road Traffic Law does not prohibit anyone from eating or drinking whilst driving. You can drink a can of beer whilst driving if you want and if you stay under the ‘limit’ and remain in control of your vehicle you can’t be prosecuted.
To ban eating and drinking in cars would prohibit the chewing of gum, would it not?
But you are allowed to use a complicated screen to control your car.
I stand corrected.
Like many myths around Road Traffic Law, it’s a common misconception.
I stand corrected, said the man to his chiropractor.
In the US though, in most states, it is illegal to drink any amount of alcohol while driving. Many states have ‘open container laws’ that deem the presence of an open container of alcoholic beverage to be evidence of a violation.
In my own state of Connecticut, drinking alcohol while driving is not permitted but passengers over 21 years of age may drink alcohol.
The only state where drinking alcohol while driving is not illegal is Mississippi, but all US states have laws against impaired driving.
Depends on the state concerning alcoholic beverages. Indiana has an open container” law for example.
I think it is illegal in some U.S. States.
49 states plus DC
Mississippi, so often equated with the UK 😝, is the sole exception.
Here in the states this retired OTR big truck driver frequently ate while guiding 30 to 40 tons GVW down the road. Never once led to a problem greater than occasional mess over a couple of million miles.
Though I never had one. Many truckers have a pet or two in their trucks. One time parked for a break at a truck stop I watched a guy pull 8 basset hounds out of his truck to walk them. There is no cure for stupid.
That being said accidents due to pets in the vehicle are pretty rare in trucking.
Up to $3,000 fine for the commercial driver and $13,000 for the company if caught with a cell phone in hand.
Oh, and never mind all the time I have seen State troopers driving with a cell phone in their hand, and those laptops they’ve got mounted in their cars so they can be used while driving.
When I was in the police in the 70’s/80’s we had a personal two way radio, a VHF two way radio and a rudimentary, manual computer location device onboard.
I frequently found myself juggling all three whilst single manned, en route at high speed to an incident. I can’t recall a single police vehicle crash with that practice implicated.
Undeniable proof that no accident ever occurred under those circumstances.
No, I did say “I can’t recall a single incident” not that there were no incidents.
But you are allowed to use a complicated screen to control your car.
That’s commercial trucking. Is commercial aviation different? Can a cockpit crewman bring his Alsatian along on a flight from London to Melbourne? No doubt it’s permitted or even encouraged if the canine is being used as a vision aide for the pilot so there’s that.
Not to Melbourne, certainly.
Just ask Johnny Depp 🙂
Lap dogs are OK in the cockpit, lap dances…not so much
Pets involved in car accidents. Famous psychotic horror author Steven King was run over while walking along a rural road by a driver wrestling with a dog. Probably the only time that’s ever happened.
Stephen King does seem a bit psychotic these days.
The data are real, and have been collected by safety agencies for decades.\
ICV fires only occur when there is a runaway reaction internal to the battery, which is due to a relatively rare manufacturing defect. Vehicle and aircraft fires often result from crashes, where the fuel system is penetrated and sparks and hot engine and exhaust systems are obviously present to ignite the fire.
Also, when battery fires occur in the context of vehicle use, the batteries are not densely packed between vehicles, meaning a battery fire in one vehicle is highly unlikely to spread to an adjacent vehicle. Fuel tank fires, however, easily spread from vehicle to vehicle because such fires are extremely rapid and violent (i.e., an explosion).
A great example is a fire that occurred here in my city just a few years ago. I live in SW Florida, where we have an extremely high number of rental vehicles are brought to the state to service customers in the winter months, then they are gathered up at the end of “season” to be shipped back north, usually by train. In a large vacant field where approx. 5,000 excess rental vehicles were parked, a single vehicle caught fire. It exploded and caused the adjacent vehicles to also catch fire. By the time firefighters were brought to the scene, the entire 5,000 vehicle inventory was on fire and the firefighters could not even approach the scene, just watch helplessly as 5,000 rental cars were consumed.
The data are real, and have been collected by safety agencies for decades.\
Then why does the article refer to Those Fires as … “The many, many fires that you have for petrol or diesel cars just aren’t reported.”
Any DATA collected by any agency must have come from Reported Incidents or the data wouldn’t exist.
Explosions in gas powered vehicles only happen in Hollywood.
If the car fire got hot enough, any gas that vaporized would be vented via the fueling tube. At worst you might have a small jet of flame coming from the vent. The gas tank itself would only explode if someone stuck a stick of dynamite into it and lit the fuse.
You have been corrected regarding the delusions of yours many times, yet you still insist on repeating lies? Why?
What about Ford Pintos?
1) Burnt, not exploded.
2) What car wouldn’t “explode” when it was struck by a much larger car going 50 or 60 mph?
Pedant 🙂
If you can’t take and Alsation, you shouldn’t be able to take a Pinto.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Le6KNI9YsH0
But fuel tank fires don’t generally happen when the car isn’t being driven
Fuel has little to do with ICE fires other than, perhaps, an initial ignition source. As I mentioned elsewhere, the materials common to ICE and EV’s sustain fires but the EV’s Lithium Ion battery is both an ignition source and the means of self sustaining a fire. Fuel tanks rarely (never in my experience) explode.
That sounds more like the ideal environment for an arsonist than a self igniting ICE. We have Tilbury docks on the River Thames close to where we live. In 30 years of thousand of ICE vehicles unloaded and parked there every day/week, I’m not aware of a single major incident of multiple self combusting vehicles.
The fact that you report a single exploding vehicle igniting the rest of them would certainly suggest to me this was a deliberate act. Only in Hollywood do ICE vehicles routinely explode.
That field of cars was reportedly from a grass fire spreading under the IC vehicles lighting the fuel in their tanks. There were hundreds of burned out cars in Paradise after that fire
in the Paris suburbs they burn every night … not reported … of course they aren’t spontaneous either …
Just wait until they drive more EV’s in those suburbs . Maybe they don’t burn spontaneous but much more spectacular.
I’m sure people let their vehicles burn up without calling either the fire department or their insurance company. It’s such a minor expense that most people wouldn’t bother to worry about it.
When I had a fire in my car caused by a fuel leak, it was easily put out with the fire extinguisher everyone should carry. There was no reason to report it, and no point in involving insurance since there was no significant damage.
“Climate Intelligence”…..LOL
Note that the Energy and Climate Intelligence Unit is an ecofascist activist group not a thinktank.
A diesel fire?
How!
In WWII, Axis tank drivers had a nickname for Allied tanks, Ronson, because they light every time.
Most of the Axis tanks were diesel.
Like many other modern models to protect certain industries, some data are fudged to make the preferred team look better.
I have attended hundreds of ICE car fires.
They were invariably stolen and torched deliberately to conceal evidence.
I say ‘invariably’ because I know of one ICE car which spontaneously combusted, at a local beauty spot when it was parked next to my neighbours car, a Citroen Grand Picasso (yes the make and model is important).
The blazing car was burned to a charred hulk. My neighbours car was scorched along it’s entire flank but didn’t ignite. The Citroen Grand Picasso is noted for it’s composite front wings (fenders) and bonnet (hood). Neither were affected beyond scorching.
The Fire service attended and extinguished the fire with a straightforward hose reel and jet (water) directly from the fire truck with no additional water supply or fire suppression methods required. As was always the case in my experience.
It’s difficult to set fire to a conventional ICE vehicle. The preferred method of the thief’s was to set fire to the interior as, even stuffing a rag down the petrol filler usually only ended up with a rag burning for a while. Tossing a match into the fuel filler usually wound up with the match being blown back out and the small blast of flame self extinguishing itself.
If it’s diesel, forget it.
In most of the car fires I attended the fuel tank was completely intact, including the contents.
Would you please clarify what you meant by “if it’s diesel, forget it”. Did you mean that it is extremely difficult to deliberately ignite diesel and cause a fire in a diesel ICE or the reverse? I may be a conspiracy theorist but I was surprised at how quickly the statement that the vehicle causing the Luton Airport multi-storey fire was issued. It seems a bit like “The (lady) doth protest too much, methinks”.
Sorry for the confusion. Yes, diesel is difficult to ignite using a match, sparks etc.
The Luton car park fire didn’t conform to any car fire I have seen. Were it a fuel leak (petrol) there would likely have been a spreading pool of the stuff burning, evident beyond the vehicle. Petrol burns quite slowly when it’s leaking so the pool tends to grow.
Diesel just tends to pool without igniting unless perhaps it’s exposed to, say, a red hot turbocharger, but that fire wasn’t under the bonnet and any exhaust would have cooled quickly.
It’s possible it could have been a conventional battery fault igniting under-bonnet materials such as soundproofing, residual oil and dirt/paint/rubber etc. which confined itself to the left hand side.
It’s almost impossible to tell without seeing the vehicle. But it’s also strange that it was nowhere near any other vehicles. How did they ignite?
From the reports that I have read, the vehicle involved in the Luton incident was a diesel hybrid, and from the video, the fire started from where the battery compartment was located.
Not only that, but the heat released during charging is lost energy
Sometimes up to one third
Green Inefficiency: Up To One Third Of Power Needed To Charge Up E-Car Battery Gets Lost! (notrickszone.com)
If the temperature is below freezing, the battery has to be warmed up before you can even start charging.
Scandinavian company came up with a suppression method to use on ferry boats.
All it takes is 250 l/min of brine chilled to -19C for about an hour.
Starts at 17:25
t=1046
But it is only an issue for firefighters, not the occupants. It is just a technical matter for firefighters. Battery fires are only hard to put out because they proceed so slowly. It is easy for a fuel fire to put out because once it gets going, it literally explodes and burns up the fuel extremely quickly – which is NOT a good deal for the occupants of such vehicles or aircraft.
For fuel fires in vehicles or aircraft, the fire risk is immediate and violent, allowing little to no time for occupants to leave the vehicle or aircraft.
Nonsense. BEV fires are sudden and often extremely violent. Nor do they proceed slowly. They also burn at a considerably higher temperature than a petrol fire.
You are obsessed with the fiction that ICE cars explode. They don’t. Petrol burns, it doesn’t explode other than in very specific circumstances.
Ignited petrol spilling from a car or plane will leave a trail of burning fuel. Only in Bruce Willis movies does burning fuel catch up with a car/plane and ignite the fuel tanks. Diesel is highly unlikely to even ignite.
Crashing cars and planes which rupture fuel tanks spread fuel, and the vapour ignites. In general terms it may look like an explosion but it’s not, it’s ignited fuel vapour.
Only in specific circumstances could petrol or diesel be described as ‘exploding’, e.g. when mixed with a specific amount of oxygen and subject to pressure and (in the case of petrol) an ignition source, e.g. within the cylinders of an ICE.
Between two vehicles igniting, a BEV and an ICE, I would far rather be in, or close to, the ICE vehicle.
Electric scooters blowing up in NYC have caused injury and (I think) deaths.
Even if the flame was fast enough to catch up with the vehicle, it still wouldn’t cause an explosion.
They can also cause a short in the electrical system governing the computer processes like rolling down windows or unlocking door which leads to occupants losing their avenue of escape
I think you have watched too many Hollywood movies.
Even the Mythbusters finally had to rig their cars with dynamite to get an explosion after many failed attempts from shear force
That was a fun episode.
Any episode that ended with something blowing up, was a fun episode.
The Ever-Delusional Duane
When Duane decides to just make it up, he goes all out.
What burns in ICE car fires, is the vehicle interior. That interior is no different from EVs. ICE vehicles do not explode, and only if the tank is ruptured during a collision, does the fuel spill.
It is just a technical matter for firefighters.
It’s a lot more that “just a technical matter”.
it literally explodes
Seriously? How many vehicle fires have you extinguished? Or is your experience all from movies?
Question: would a HALON fire suppression system be effective? I remember way back in the day, when the Abrams tank first came to the troops, it was equipped with a automatic HALON fire suppression system. Then later due to environmental pressures, the system was changed to CO2.
No, inert gas (oxygen displacement) will not work, because a lithium battery fire does not require air, it has the fuel and the oxidizer within itself.
Thank you.
Indeed, magnesium and lithium will burn in CO2.
The big difference is a fire extinguisher carried in a car or truck can often put out a gasoline or diesel fire by smothering it. It will not put out a lithium battery fire because it has its own oxygen.
Anyone who has ever seen a Gasoline or Diesel fire and the counterpart EV Battery fire can certainly attest to the volatility of EV fires comparatively speaking
When I was in high school chemistry – way back in ’66, my teacher wanted to show us how lithium doesn’t react nicely with water. So he dropped a pellet of it in a glass of water- and it flamed up- all the way to the asbestos ceiling where it left a black burn mark. He wasn’t prepared for that. We were all shocked. That was his last year in the school. Strange, but that’s the first time I recalled that incident since it happened.
It must have a sizeable piece of lithium as reactivity of alkali metals increases as move down the column, with Francium being more reactive than Caesium being more reactive than Rubidium being more reactive than Potassium being more reactive than Sodium being more reactive than Lithium.
However the Lithium reaction with water lasts longer than Sodium with water.
Sodium and gasoline/petrol and water. Will sodium batteries be any safer than lithium?
https://youtube.com/shorts/UD9-tptt0bg?si=C8qxOSwop5PYtDgn
The more energy density and the higher rate of discharge that you put into a battery, the closer to a bomb it becomes. Standard lead-acid cells in a vehicle accident are discharge rate limited by damage to their own housing, compared to higher energy density batteries made of lithium or sodium where housing damage can lead to catastrophic failure worse than the accident that started the problem…
Had almost exactly the same issue experience in eleventh grade chemistry class. The teacher dropped a half-dollar size chunk of lithium into water to show the violent reaction. The lithium stripped the oxygen away from the hydrogen in the water, releasing hydrogen gas. The reaction was exothermic. When the hydrogen gas bubbled out of the water it ignited with a rather loud boom. Startled everyone, including the teacher. (She used much smaller pieces of lithium after that!). Oddly enough, that would have been in 1966!
Here’s someone with a channel devoted to examining EV fires. The distortions / cover-up of a fire in NZ were particularly interesting: https://www.youtube.com/@MGUYTV
The YouTube channels Geoff Buys Cars and The MacMaster are also excellent on EV’s, and highly entertaining to boot.
A typical fire needs three things, fuel, oxygen and enough heat for ignition. A battery vehicle fire cannot be extinguished by lowering the temperature of the fuel or denying oxygen to the fuel. Extremely dangerous non-normal fire. I wonder what changes ferry auto operators will make.
Throwing it overboard might work in some cases. The next best thing is dumping the EV in a big bucket of water, which would be difficult on a ferry without a major redesign. I spoke to some local firefighters, they said they can’t stop the fire, but they can reduce the damage to everything around it by spraying a mist of water on it to reduce the temperature and waiting for the fire to burn itself out. I suspect using a water mist to prevent the EV fire from spreading or melting through the steel deck will be the solution for ferries. Spraying a mild, non-toxic acid like acetic acid (vinegar) might also help neutralise the lithium into a less flammable form, though this would require a lot of research.
Just load all EVs, on ferry crossings, onto open air barges towed behind the ferry. If one ignites during the crossing, open a trapdoor below it and dump it in the drink
Yes, and also I think it would be too expensive to have individual trapdoors for each EV on the barge, so the simplest thing is to equip the barge with remotely detonated scuttle charges. Make sure each EV owner knows that if any EV catches fire, they’re all being scuttled. See how many are willing to take the risk…
Spring-loaded parking spaces around the perimeter of the ferry, all BEVs are parked on those. If/when one catches fire it melts the fusible link that releases the spring that tips the vehicle overboard. Done deal.
That sounds (to a layperson) almost ‘doable’.
Or something even lower tech: suspend each car using a rope harness. Car catches on fire, rope burns, gravity does the rest.
The toxicity of lithium species, as well as the hydrogen fluoride and hydrogen chloride vapors produced, are also underplayed.
Most of the dangerous lithium species are at least mildly soluble, so a continuous water spray, acting as a continuous extraction process, while pumping the waste overboard, might contain the risk to the passengers. Obviously it would still be a serious emergency.
“When a fire ripped through a car park at Luton airport last month it set off a round of speculation that an electric vehicle was to blame. The theory was quickly doused by the Bedfordshire fire service, which said the blaze appeared to have started in a diesel car.” – the Guardian
Well, it does indeed seem to have been started by a diesel vehicle. But to be more specific, by the lithium battery in a diesel hybrid. It seems to me that the Bedfordshire fire service lied by omission, and the Guardian were more than happy to promote the lie.
I believe you but could you provide a Link?
There is a Youtube analysis of that particular fire. Sure looked like a battery started it off.
There’s an analysis on Youtube (witty, but very long):
There’s a more succinct written report at The Daily Sceptic.
A common feature of many reports is the way authorities are covering up.
“He added that diesel is “much less flammable” than petrol and in a car it takes “intense pressure or sustained flame” to ignite diesel.”
So I found this quoted multiple times. The person said, without saying, that it must have been a Lithium Battery or other Incendiary device to get the diesel burning. They are REALLY afraid to put the cause on a lithium battery. The spokespeople’s jobs are political. They know what they can and can’t say and still keep their jobs.
I tested that theory about diesel-fuel being very hard to ignite, by creating a small puddle and applying an open flame. It just would NOT ignite at all, even when the open flame was applied to a rag soaked in the diesel. That explains why a diesel-engine requires such a high compression-ratio to achieve combustion.
Agreed- I used to use it (kerosene) to burn brush piles. Not easy to start. By comparison, I once threw a cup of gasoline into a fire and it exploded almost like a hand grenade but without the shrapnel.
And a high school girl in Texas just died from burns over 90% of her body from throwing gas on a fire.
Really scary. I guess all the important porn and multigender training in schools, even in Texas, doesn’t leave much time for important things.
I have known grown men to be that dumb.
Darwin award?
Boy scout trick from 55 years ago…pour an ounce or so of gasoline in a paper cup, fold the top down to prevent much splashing on impact, then throw it on your failed campfire lighting attempt from 5 yards away, having left gas can a further 20 yards back. At one time performed by Scoutmasters everywhere….
Kero burns a lot more readily than diesel.
I thought that was pancake syrup… oh, wait..
I would think so because diesel is more difficult to ignite than gasoline. It’s because it doesn’t produce vapors so you need something like a wick to reduce the mass enough to get it started. You can throw a match in a bucket of diesel and the match will go out. On the other hand, we had a heater at our gun club that was used to warn orange groves called a smudge pot. You would fill it with diesel and then throw some lit wadded up news paper in it. The paper would burn until the diesel was warm enough to produce it own vapor and then every body was nice and warm.
3rg post.
It appears that the Luton fire is at least the 2nd fire that caused the almost complete demolition of a car park in the UK.
I don’t remember hearing of any such destructive fire in the US, but large parking structures are fire sprinkler in the US.
Once there are enough EVs around it will happen, sprinklers or not.
Just wait till they’re a more regular part of the population of cars parked Beneath Apartments
I have become sensitive to EVs parking in underground carparks. I will not park next to one and find I get somewhat annoyed if I find one parked next to my car on return.
The video is interesting. I wonder why the camera vibrates as if it is in wind. And why it is mostly focused on the Tesla. Almost as if they are expecting the explosion.
I think it was likely from a review of the security tapes. There is a date range at the bottom. Likely it was being reviewed to determine if there was any foul play involved and one of the reviewers recorded the viewing on their phone
A few weeks ago, I read an article, about a bus company, that wanted to garage a fleet of EV buses underneath a block of flats, containing about 400 residents!!!!
There is a black box on the wall behind the dark vehicle on the right. Do you think that is the charging station? Take a look at it starting at the 45sec mark. Looks like something is shorting out. Never occurred to me that a failure in the charging station could short out the battery and cause a quick runaway thermal reaction.
Just one more point of concern.
Not sure, though Teslas charging port is behind the Drivers side rear taillight and wouldn’t be visible to determine if it were charging at the time.
That’s one reason why some Retirement Villages are now banning the charging of EV batteries in underground garages. Our village has done that here in Auckland.
There is absolutely no doubt the initial fire was from a lithium battery, from the orange-red flames, absence of black smoke, and the powerful jet-like outgassing.
Not totally necessary..
As our man Rud keeps insisting, hybrids tend(ed) to use NiMH batteries = the sort you’ll find in solar powered garden lights and we all know those don’t tend to have many incendiary tendencies. i.e. Are generally (haha) bombproof.
There is a you-tuber name of Big Clive and he has a very inquisitive mind about electrical devices of all sorts.
Some may accuse him of recklessness, but he fearlessly takes them apart to find out how they work.
In a notable little video he investigated NiMH cells – just the small AA size from ‘garden solar lights’. He did so because some cells had come to his attention claiming massively greater capacity than ordinary NiMH cells always have.
By a very big factor and precisely what would draw the attention of car-makers.
He disassembled an ordinary cell and a high capacity side by side and while explaining the intricacies of the normal low-capacity cell, the disassembled high-capacity parts simply took fire. Right there on his workbench.
IOW. Just exposing the innards of a contemporary “high capacity” NiMH cell to Oxygen will cause a fire. No need for a fault, overcharging, overheating or anything much. Possibly rapid overcharging bursting the cell’s ‘seal’
All that is otherwise needed is maybe some (salt) water to corrode the case, let in the Oxygen and away they go….
Or what classically cracks/breaks/damages car windscreens = stones and other junk thrown up off the badly maintained pot-hole riddled dirt-tracks called ‘roads’ these days.
That will be The Killer for large Lithiums slung underneath overweight cars with already low to zero ground clearance, as all EVs are.
I worked it out – the driver of the EV in The Luton Fire ‘shunted’ one of the concrete pillars holding up the car park.
For cramped spaces as multi-stories are and over-sized vehicles like Discos and Range Rovers, nothing else could possibly happen.
The (young kid) driver crashed the front wing (where the battery is/was) into a concrete post while up to something naughty, like, delivering drugs in an un-taxed, uninsured and probably stolen car registered at a fake address.
And when they saw what had happened, pulled on their balaclava and ran like fook.
It makes perfect sense, there’s an ongoing scandal exactly about those cars and how insanely easy they are to steal
(something to do with the boot (trunk) and the keyless locking/starting etc etc etc
….or working as ‘escort‘ and taxi service for a ‘mule’ just disembarked from a long-haul flight….
Before aspirin was invented around 1900 everybody with access used opium and opiates for pain(and pleasure) with very few deaths.
In the late 1920s and early 1930s, the US Mortality and Morbidity Reports only reported an average of 35 deaths per year from opium and opiates compared to around 3,000 deaths from alcohol per year.
Here is a link to the 1925 report: https://www.cdc.gov/nchs/data/vsushistorical/mortstatsh_1925.pdf
The others are in the same library.
This is quite insane…
The UK now has cameras, installed in vans & cars parked on motorway bridges & rest-areas, also atop metal poles, that can, from well over half a mile away see into a car doing 60 or 70 mph and tell if the car taxed and insured, what fuel it uses, who the driver is, if they are on the phone, playing a computer game, having sex or swigging a tin of pop. Even at night in the dark.
Within milliseconds they can know all that and issue whatever Penalty Charge Notice(s) are deemed necessary. There are plenty to choose from.
Yet in a place such as packed-out carpark at a busy international airport crawling with security people and every technological marvel there ever was, we still don’t know anything about a stationary car and who its driver/owner/keeper was
Silly question but: wtf is going on here
Everyone knows the answer, but it’s too politically inconvenient to be revealed.
Wtf is going on?
The same thing that went on when they couldn’t identify who brought cocaine into the White House.
Strange that almost none of the MSM have reported that incident, when a multi-storey car park with over 1500 vehicles were destroyed apparently due to a self-igniting lithium battery!
It seems to be a very confused story.
Apparently the reg plate shows it was a 2014 Land Rover of some sort. There were no hybrids in the LR range back then.
Maybe it was a personal plate put onto a newer vehicle?
Whatever the source of the fire, it will be interesting to see what the official investigation picks up with regard to any EVs which added to the intensity of the fire.
Which registration plate? The one which is shown clearly in the much later released photographs? Or the one in the original video which, although it can’t be seen completely clearly, the blurred shape looks very different to the one in the later photo’s.
Perhaps there are more possible ignition causes than just the battery in a ICE vehicle, but even If that reported story isn’t a direct lie, it is much, much more likely to be a statistical lie that does not account for the fact that the number of BEV vehicles in use is only a tiny % of the number of ICE vehicles. That is to say, it isn’t comparing fires by the % of vehicle types.
Another application of “Lies, Damn Lies, and Statistics”.
I know someone who has just bought a BEV in Australia. The reason was that it was available now. The ICE car she really wanted had at least a 3-month delivery. Her current car gets handed down to oldest grandson so his current car can be handed on to brother who has his licence for the coming school term – so time pressure. I have not made any point about the obvious conclusion that can be drawn from the relative availability.
My local Kia dealer only has BEVs in stock for immediate sale. Waits for Toyota and Maxda vehicles here are so long that people taking delivery now can sell them for a significant profit.
I didn’t point out the potential difficulties of owning a BEV. It is a fashion statement for her and it will not be used much. It will likely get charged in an attached garage so that comes with fire risk that I should point out under the right circumstances.
I have a friend who owns an EV, but he only uses it for local trips. If he needs to do some serious driving he uses a diesel 4WD. Australia’s roads are too messed up to use a normal road vehicle in a lot of places, let alone an EV.
Many accidents there from driving on “the wrong side of the road”?
Even if/when synthetic zero CO2 fuels usable in existing ICE vehicles become economically viable Guardian-types will still find something to object to with them because the ultimate aim isn’t to cut CO2 emissions but to limit individual mobility and freedom.
What is the point of trying to keep it cold?
The Earth is still in a 2+ million-year ice age named the Quaternary Glaciation.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Quaternary_glaciation
Twenty percent of the land is frozen, either as permafrost or underneath glaciers.
Around 10 times as many people die from cold-related causes as heat-related causes, 4.6 million versus 500,000.
https://www.thelancet.com/journals/lanplh/article/PIIS2542-5196(21)00081-4/fulltext
https://www.thelancet.com/journals/lancet/article/PIIS0140-6736(14)62114-0/fulltext
Cool or cold air causes our bodies to constrict their blood vessels to conserve heat. This causes our blood pressure to rise causing extra deaths in the cooler months.
This ice age won’t end until there is no natural ice on the Earth.
Slightly off topic but relevant.
Diesel engines, in order to conform to fairly recent emissions standard on particulates, are fitted with a Diesel Particulate Filter that is supposed to collect particulates from the exhaust and then burn the accumulated mass every so often. The DPF has been linked to several vehicle fires, possibly including the massive Liverpool car park fire, and seems to be a particular problem with Jaguar Land Rover diesel models.
This is true. But looking at the CCTV of the LR in the Luron car park, it sure looked like it started at the hybrid battery area. Bright orange fire, no black smoke etc.
The CCTV footage was available on YouTube
No, I think Luton was something different. Liverpool probably started with a DPF and spread to EV’s quite quickly, which caused the whole thing to go up. Even if nothing else is done, ICE and EV cars shouldn’t be mixed in the same car park.
All these hot, modern features of automobiles, who doesn’t want a new car?
Cute!
The hot running periodically to burn the soot in the ceramic filter is called “regen” for regeneration.
At least 50% of the time I had a problem with the engine in a big truck it was due to a pollution control system problem.
I’m surprised automotive engineers haven’t taken a leaf out of ICE distributor tech and isolated the electrolyte from the battery, delivering the smaller amount needed at each moment for powering demand. Having all the electrolyte concentrated in thousands of “AA” -type batteries all connected live in multi series and parallel circuits, even when parked is like having your ICE in your gas tank! The actual electrolyte isn’t inflammable at all. I don’t have an image of how it might be accomplished, but to me, we should improve on the 100 year old way we power a flashlight!!
Thousands of batteries all connected also would multiply the probability of failure from even a very small incidence of manufacturing flaws.
I suspect the Lithium is too dangerous to handle this way, the consequences of a leak which ended up contaminating a family space could be bad. There are batteries such as vanadium redox batteries which allow separate storage of electrolytes, but the energy density is nowhere near high enough for EVs.
Possibly, you could have (say) a twelve ‘cylinder’ car with robustly-made permanent battery shells from which the electrolyte could be drained from the cells into a holding tank when parked. In city driving, maybe only half the cells would be active.
Lithium batteries don’t have an electrolyte as we think of it. They are a dry cell without wet insides. Everything is rolled up or layered and remains in the same location until the cell is destroyed. The cells have always been bigger than an AA cell with the 18650 as the smallest one. They are making bigger batteries now which reduces the risk but you’re talking 400 volts and over 100 amp hours which takes a lot of small cells to accomplish. Even with lead acid batteries your talking around 30 car sized batteries. Batteries just don’t work well for high voltage. When I was young, I visited a telephone exchange. They had a single cell they were working on that was about 2 foot by 2 foot by almost 5 foot high. It produced 2 volts and they ganged them up for the 48 volts the exchanged needed for battery backup. These are the same type of battery used to power Diesel subs during WWII. Weight is subs can be a good thing but that’s about the only place it’s good.
You can’t make a battery that way! How would you charge it if the electrolyte wasn’t in the battery???
Electrolyte isn’t fuel for the battery, it is part of the battery.
Oh, I forgot to add the the electrolyte is usually a gell, so one can’t drain it.
Even if you could, that would require heavy piping and pumps, which would also be other points of failure.
I’m baffled that so many governments are forcing EV mandates, and yet solid electrolyte batteries are still off on the horizon – it’s obvious that they don’t care at all about us and our health and livelihoods.
It is mass delusion, stoked by the UN/IPPC and the media.
The mass delusion is like the stock market boom in the 1920s when everybody wanted a piece of the action before its crash and the following Great Depression in the 1930s when people came back to their senses.
the cost of the battery pack is already huge … and thats making them with over the counter cells mass produced in a factory … I’m sure some bright engineer can make lithium batteries safer … in the lab and never capable of being commercially viable …
Fire in Croydon NSW in e-bike warehouse
Fire and Rescue NSW battles e-bike factory fire in Sydney’s inner west – Croydon – Fire and Rescue NSW
Wow, insane
A better way to think about it from a chemistry stand point is this: a gas or diesel needs air to burn, a battery is closer to nitroglycerin when it goes exothermic.
The word “fire” is not really appropriate for lithium batteries, which contain their own oxidizer. “Thermal runaway” or even “explosion” fit the bill better.
Rocket fuel!!
It is hard to remove the heat in order to put out the fire when the battery is discharging into a short circuit supplying enough heat to vaporize the actual battery. It is not just a fire. There is an electric discharge component as well. Spraying water on the dissolved battery electrolyte salts makes the water conductive which just adds to the short circuit increasing the generated heat.
Yes you do jump to logical conclusions with the trash…err.. recycling stream nowadays-
Melbourne news: Melbourne factory fire downgraded but continues to burn for second day (9news.com.au)
What the hell is an “International climate forecaster”?
Someone like Hans Christian Anderson or The Brothers Grimm, i.e. a spinner of fairy tales from another country.
“… a forklift accidentally punctured a container with battery materials, causing the fire”
Sheesh! You’d think those containers would be located in a place not likely to be damaged- with big warning signs all around them.
As a Fire Inspector as I drove by a loading dock I noticed a 55 gallon drum with the red diamond fire symbol stored beside the roll up door under some rack storage.
I stopped, went in and initiated an inspection of the location. It was not me regular area, I was covering it while another inspector was out for medical reasons.
The drum was brake cleaner, really flammable. I asked how long it was to be there and the manager said that was where they stored it. I then asked what his plan was for when the forklift accidently punched a hole in it. He had no answer. We found a much safer location to store the drum. I also found about 20 other silly hazards, easily remedied. Yes, I was from the government, and I was there to help, in this case.
The warehouse was a Ford paint and parts warehouse. Lots of automotive paint, high volume output fire sprinkler system. You would think the manager of such a location would have some training regarding the hazards of storing flammable liquids, he had NONE.
Being a Fire Inspector was 50% inspection, 50% education. Easier to get compliance if people understand the WHY.
There seems to be an immutable law of nature that every kind of thing, some time or other, will be either run over or gored by a forklift. There is a corollary that something you paid for will be destroyed by a forklift while being shipped to you, or when you ship it.
Might be interesting in the NE U.S. Tuesday night into Wednesday. Snow followed by rain followed very quickly by a quick freeze.
Those chunks of frozen slush are hard on the underside of vehicles.
Considering that BEVs are new technology, there are an awful lot of them catching fire. I wonder ow many Model T Fords self ignited, when they first came out? 😊
Why do you say BEVs are new technology?
First BEV was made in Holland in 1835 not new at all.
With lithium batteries?
With
AC permanent magnet synchronous motor, liquid-cooled, with variable frequency drive?
Some people don’t get it, do they?
Of course not. AC generators and motors had not been invented in 1835. Probably a DC motor with a separately excited field.
Probably shunt wound.
That might be pushing it I’m not sure but I don’t think they had commutators until 1838.
Looking around, there are several dates quoted. from 1832 – 1838. But I’ll side with you.
I was actually quite surprised at how advanced electrical motor theory was back then. I always thought it was more modern like late 1800’s to early 1900’s. Learn something every day.🤔😉
No but it used batteries and it drove around so it was an EV. Still not the first though but the first one that worked. Not rechargeable
Just a matter of interest, we’ve had significant flooding in parts of the U.K. with people driving at inappropriate speeds through floodwater, what is the potential problems if floodwater
a) gets into the battery compartment of an EV or hybrid as it is located on the underside of the vehicle?
b) floodwater gets into the engine compartment due to either the driver misjudging the depth of water or an oncoming bow wave?
…c) How much worse does this damage become if the flood water is salt water? (something that commonly occurs as a hurricane/cyclone/tropical storm/whatever comes ashore.)
Eric. I think there may be two types of Lion battery fires. There are thermal runaway fires which are extremely hot and are not extinguishable with conventional firefighting techniques. But some (/most? /all?) Lion batteries use flammable electrolytes. Those presumably can be extinguished by conventional techniques. Since the Genius Star XI fire was reportedly controlled with Carbon Dioxide, it seems likely that it was an electrolyte fire, not a thermal runaway fire.
A few other factoids that I found on the internet:
. LiFePO4 batteries seem to be replacing other Lion technologies in some applications. They have a lower energy density than Lion (bad), but a higher (by 50C) thermal run away temperature (good) and are possibly less temperamental.
. Lion batteries are generally shipped 20-30% charged for (unexplained) “safety” reasons. Don’t ask me why this is safer than uncharged. Doesn’t seem safer to me. But what do I know?
. Tesla will be happy to sell you a Lion Powerwall (13.5kwh of storage) for your house. (NOTE: not my house thanks). Why Lion which burns rather than a less flammable technology that doesn’t? I shouldn’t be surprised that home insurance companies will end up adding a surcharge for homeowners who host aging Powerwalls.
I bought a South Sierra off-grid cabin a couple years ago; its only power is a solar/battery system. The batteries are deep cycle lead/acid gel, so no electrolyte maintenance. There is a thermal sensor on one of the batteries that the charge controller uses as some kind of control feedback for the charging – I’m hazy about the many functions and features of my system, I do intend to master it this coming spring – it’s 3.2F up there as I write.
Some of my neighbors are using lion battery banks. I’ve not looked into lion for this application, but I assume they are as aware of Li battery fires as the next person. The only fire in the last two years I’m aware of was caused by a portable propane space heater.
Lithium batteries have a much shorter life when completely discharged. Only taking them to 20-30% gives them some charge and enough to last until they are sold or installed as they will self discharge over time. It’s better than shipping them fully charged where a short will provide far more heat to set off a runaway reaction. NiCad could be shipped discharged and that was a way to removed charge memory from the cell. Lead acid should be maintained at full charge however by the time they are installed they normally have lost over 20% of their charge.
I’ve seen many ICE fires in 55 years driving. Also been involved in dealing with a couple. Most involved old cars, lack of maintenance, but DIY modifications to electrics such as sound systems and lights seem to have started most fires. I’ve used a couple of fire extinguishers saving vehicles including one belonging to my son.
In years to come as the number of old BEVs increases and work their way down to people who can’t afford maintenance or who mess around with the car to improve it then I can only see fires started by something other than the main battery increasing in frequency, how well the battery is protected from an external fire will be a key factor in how this pan out.
EV fires are far less common than ICV fires, not just because there are fewer EVs on the road, but the actual rate of fires if far less. That is per actual real world accident data. Look it up.
Not only that, but EV fires are far less dangerous to occupants than ICV fires. That’s pretty easy to understand, actually, when considering how a fire in a battery works – the descriptors are “slowly” and “non-violently” for battery fires, vs. instantly and violently in a gas tank or diesel tank explosion.
Battery fires are harder to put out, but that is only an issue for firefighters to be concerned about, not the occupants of the vehicles who can easily remove themselves before being consumed by a battery fire, while gasoline or diesel fuel fires are extremely dangerous and indeed fatal to the occupants of vehicles with fuel tanks.
Just look to the Twin Towers on 9.11.01. The crashes of the airliners into the buildings did not bring the towers down. It was the residual jet fuel burning violently that overheated the structural steel frame causing them to fail and bring down the towers.
Air crash data have long confirmed that the second most common cause of death of aircraft occupants in air crashes, after blunt force trauma, is the post crash fire. That’s why most jet airliners today when they experience equipment failures, such as in landing gear or flaps failing to deploy on approach to landing, will then fly away from the airport and either dump excess fuel, or else fly a holding pattern until the excess fuel is burned up, before attempting a risky landing.
How many ICE vehicle fires are the result of arson or insurance fraud?
You should not watch so many movies
Burning diesel or even JP5 will not melt structural steel. Not even close. Maybe if it is under pressure mixed with pure oxygen in a torch but not just spilled all over a building and lit on fire.
As usual, Duane can’t be bothered producing real data. He knows that if he dared to do that, the rest of us would quickly tear him apart. Again.
FIrst off, if Duane is using the same made up data he did last time, his base number is not cars on the road, but rather total cars sold in the previous model year.
There are a lot fewer EVs sold per year, the number of years EVs have been on the market is a lot less, and the number of EVs sold has been increasing as government mandates and subsidies continue to grow.
When you do an accurate comparison of the number of EV vs ICEV on the road, and then correct for the age of the two fleets, and then compensate for the different way the two fleets are actually driven, then you find out that this so called advantage of the EV fleet is entirely imaginary.
There’s a reason why insurance companies have been jacking up EV insurance rates in recent years.
It’s because 1) they can do math, unlike Duane, and they have their own money on the line.
PS, planes dump fuel to get the weight down. If a plane has to immediately turn around and land after taking off, the weight of the fuel is enough to collapse the landing gear.
Also a lighter plane can land at a slower speed.
Come on Duane, get your head back into the real world here.
This is a biased and incompetent article
EV Derangement Syndrome Stage IV
BASIC DATA MISSING
What percentage of EVs catch fire?
0.0012%
there was a 0.0012% chance of a passenger electric vehicle battery catching fire, compared with a 0.1% chance for internal combustion engine cars. Tesla is the world’s biggest maker of electric cars.
Nov 25, 2023
Electric Cars Can Catch Fire. We Must Run And Tell The King! – CleanTechnica
Did you miss the part about being harder to extinguish? Like hours? And many times more water?
And many times more water?
ICE: maybe a couple hundred gallons. EV: well over 30,000 gallons (3x as much as a typical house fire)
maybe a couple hundred gallons.
and that would be fully involved.
Great. Now do you want to go and tell that to the families of the over 80 people killed in Tesla fires? I’m sure they’ll be completely reassured by your kind and sensitive words.
Richard uses the same defective source of information as does Duane.
The Nitro-Glycerine analogy is a bad one. Nitro-Glycerine is indeed extremely unstable and highly energetic when excited by teensy shock. However the reason Nobel is a famous name, is he found a way to suppress this instability to make it highly useful as Dynamite. While the world no longer uses or makes nitro based dynamite, the analogy to Lion batteries is misguided. There is no magical Diatomaceous Earth which will stabilize the Lithium Ion battery tendency to spontaneously combust as the Diatomaceous Earth did with Nitro-Glycerine.
Regarding fires with devices or systems of Lion batteries – as compared to vehicle fires with petrol or diesel. A moderately trained person with a 10 or 15 lb dry chemical fire extinguisher can knock down a fully involved car fire in a few minutes with proper technique. To knock down (put out) a Lion battery fire in an EV requires tens of thousands of gallons of water often spraying it for many hours to days.
The former works by displacing oxygen from the liquid hydrocarbon fueled fire, and the latter can only attempt to remove heat as the Lion battery supplies oxygen from internal chemical reactions.
I put out a ICE car fire in a garage with using a standard garden hose and saved the garage. The interior of the car was fully engulfed when I started.
batteries are stored energy not fuel … a gas tank is store fuel that requires a generator to turn it into energy … storing/containing energy is alot more dangerous than storing fuel … when it decides to “break free” its alot more energetic …
From the article: “This safety alert aims to raise awareness of the risks involved with the carriage of battery-powered electric vehicles (BEVs) on roll-on, roll-off (RORO) ferries. . .
Consideration must be given to the hazards arising from transporting BEVs and a vessel specific procedure developed for the prevention and mitigation of fire incidents involving BEVs.”
The ferry operator should make the EV park right next to the ramp, so it can be pushed off into the water if it catches fire. 🙂