Lithium battery fire risks

zoidberg

zoidberg

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I have no 'dog in this fight' nor have I informed opinion on the problem, but I came across this article in another context, and thought it worth sharing here.

New Marine Fire Hazards

This place has a 'legacy' track record of the identification and promulgation of little-known emergent boaty hazards - the 'Non DZR brass' scandal, the 'slipping shaft face-seal' problem, the 'emergency ladder' with UV-rotted clips - that some distributors have tried to stifle, rather than acknowledge and fix. Other, highly-reputable, businesses face up squarely to an identified issue and stand by their customers' safety interests, which leads to more business - not less. They are worth our visible support....
 
zoidberg said:
I have no 'dog in this fight' nor have I informed opinion on the problem, but I came across this article in another context, and thought it worth sharing here.

New Marine Fire Hazards

This place has a 'legacy' track record of the identification and promulgation of little-known emergent boaty hazards - the 'Non DZR brass' scandal, the 'slipping shaft face-seal' problem, the 'emergency ladder' with UV-rotted clips - that some distributors have tried to stifle, rather than acknowledge and fix. Other, highly-reputable, businesses face up squarely to an identified issue and stand by their customers' safety interests, which leads to more business - not less. They are worth our visible support....
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Tesla announced a switch to lifePO4 battery technology last October. They will use this in all their entry level cars. It doesn't have the energy density of other lithium chemistries but it's safer and cheaper.
In the future it is likely that electric cars will have liquid cooled batteries that will better control thermal runaway and probably fires.
 
It's right to be concerned about lithium ion chemistries if they go into thermal runaway but they are a heterogenous family and LiFePO4 (LFP), while not having the highest energy density, is remarkably stable as this video shows. I would be happy leaving my LFP charging unattended but would be wary of leaving other types of lithium ion batteries charging unattended on the boat.

Pictures occasionally emerge of burnt-out LFP installations - often in vehicles - but invariably these are caused by poor installation practices. The energy density of these batteries is so high that heat from resistance and fire from short-circuits are the main culprits. Main fuses of high ampere interrupt capacity (AIC) are required - Class T being recommended - and any installation needs to be checked for hot-spots at connection including bus-bar connections between cells in DIY installations.

 
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I don't see the risk of carrying boaty equipment with lipo batteries as much different to carrying pyro; be aware of the risk but get on with your sailing. If your mobile phone started behaving like a signal flare the safest thing to do is hand it to Davey Jones, the same applies to EPIRBs or anything else with high power density batteries.
 
oldgit said:
wet batteries on boats are not without their perils ?
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I’ve had a lead acid go bang in the night. It was a violent explosion and if I’d been in the engine room I would have been injured.
I’m just building a lithium battery test facility in work.
The fire strategy is to chuck em outside and let them burn. They are essentially un-extinguishable.
If a phone battery goes into thermal meltdown you’d find a way of getting it over the side.
If a full size lithium goes into thermal meltdown you will lose you boat.
They are not for me.
 
Elessar said:
I’ve had a lead acid go bang in the night. It was a violent explosion and if I’d been in the engine room I would have been injured.
I’m just building a lithium battery test facility in work.
The fire strategy is to chuck em outside and let them burn. They are essentially un-extinguishable.
If a phone battery goes into thermal meltdown you’d find a way of getting it over the side.
If a full size lithium goes into thermal meltdown you will lose you boat.
They are not for me.
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People will make their own choice but on a public forum it is important to correct misinformation. LiFePO4 (LFP) needs to be distinguished from other lithium ion chemistries as said above. Reducing the argument to the difference between 'lithium' and lead acid is simply misleading.
 
As someone who used to drop bombs for a living, I've developed an aversion to 'things that go bang in the night'.
That's why I don't have stored gas inside my boat, nor petrol..... nor lithium batteries.
 
Poey50 said:
People will make their own choice but on a public forum it is important to correct misinformation. LiFePO4 (LFP) needs to be distinguished from other lithium ion chemistries as said above. Reducing the argument to the difference between 'lithium' and lead acid is simply misleading.
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Ok fair point. Happy to be educated. Will read more about it.
 
zoidberg said:
As someone who used to drop bombs for a living, I've developed an aversion to 'things that go bang in the night'.
That's why I don't have stored gas inside my boat, nor petrol..... nor lithium batteries.
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no mobile? no laptops and no newish powertools then?
 
Our lad an electrical engineer tests electrical vehicle components for a living, a couple of years ago they did a drop test on part of a lithium power pack from a car. It ignited in spectacular style 30 seconds after the test, 3 fire engines who basically watched it burn out. There are plenty of vids on you tube showing such battery fires. A lead acid can explode but the acid can be washed down with a bucket of water or hosed away. On cars the batteries are usually located under the floor in areas away from crumple zones for good reason with firewalls separating them from the passengers. If you have watched the program Vintage voltage you will notice that they stick the batteries where the engine came out & in the boot. These are the areas that get damaged first in a crash. You would not want to be in a heavy shunt in one of these conversions.
Back to boats all the fancy electronics such installations require & salt air? how long are they going to last before something goes wrong? how safe will it be ten years on?
 
Keith 66 said:
Our lad an electrical engineer tests electrical vehicle components for a living, a couple of years ago they did a drop test on part of a lithium power pack from a car. It ignited in spectacular style 30 seconds after the test, 3 fire engines who basically watched it burn out. There are plenty of vids on you tube showing such battery fires. A lead acid can explode but the acid can be washed down with a bucket of water or hosed away. On cars the batteries are usually located under the floor in areas away from crumple zones for good reason with firewalls separating them from the passengers. If you have watched the program Vintage voltage you will notice that they stick the batteries where the engine came out & in the boot. These are the areas that get damaged first in a crash. You would not want to be in a heavy shunt in one of these conversions.
Back to boats all the fancy electronics such installations require & salt air? how long are they going to last before something goes wrong? how safe will it be ten years on?
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Your first paragraph is not relevant to marine applications but is another example of failing to distinguish LFP from the other chemistries.

With regard to electronics do people find their chart plotters fail in marine environments? Some people run LFP packs with no electronics. This in my view is foolish since LFP can't tolerate abuse like lead acid but, and plenty of people have ruined their investment. There are many photos of terminally bloated LFP cells on the Web but no one seems to have managed to put their cells into thermal runaway. I've seen several photos of burnt out installations, often on RVs, where there is a big melted and charred mess but the cells haven't burnt.

There are many good reasons not to use LFP on a boat but fire risk from the chemistry itself is not one of them. But I keep an open mind and it is difficult to prove a negative so, for those who have time on their hands and access to the Internet, do search for a verified example of an LFP thermal runaway fire on a boat and report it here.

You will, of course, be able to find examples of other lithium battery fires on boats usually small devices like mobile phones on charge.
 
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