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Originally Posted by TiltonBB
On Saturday, a Sanbornton house fire was started by lithium batteries. It's enough to make you think twice about having these in your home.
A statement from the fire department, “this phenomenon is known as a 'Thermal Runaway', which is one of the primary risks related to Lithium-ion Batteries.”
According to the statement, the roof of the garage collapsed within two minutes of arrival of the first fire companies. “This we believe is due to the failure of the roof truss system based on the fire load and the weight of the 24 solar panels on the south facing side of the garage roof,” wrote Deputy Chief Scott Taylor.
https://www.laconiadailysun.com/news...ticle-nav-next
Lithium batteries seem to be the common factor in many fires. One third of all car fires in the US are in electric cars although they make up a much smaller percentage of the total number of cars on the road. Hurricane Ian's floodwaters caused at least 11 electric vehicles in Florida to catch fire.
Although electric vehicles continue to improve, I am not sure I would want one in my garage. |
Not all batteries that use lithium react the same way to error conditions.
Lifepo4 batteries in particular have shown to be very resilient to various kinds of damage and somewhat difficult to get into a condition where the battery causes a runaway thermal event (fire, etc.).
The ABYC (American Boat and Yacht Council) has begun publishing standards regarding lithium/lifepo4 batteries in marine applications and the general conclusion is that they are no more risky than SLA batteries, or gas tanks, etc. However, like any highly dense energy storage device, they do need to be installed and maintained properly for safe operation. This mostly comes down to ensuring that the cables, connectors, fusing, etc. is adequate for the battery systems and their potential for much higher sustained output currents.
Regarding the risks of an EV in your garage, you may or may not remember the issue with F-series vehicles in the early 2000's catching fire while parked, due to a flaw in the brake master cylinder and wiring around it, as just one example.
There is no "safe" vehicle technology on the market when it comes right down to it.