Let's Go All In On Battery Tools . . . Or?

G

ghostice

Been here a while
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A Strange Little Country to the North
As a member of the "Consultant Debunking Unit" in some large process industry projects, from time to time we came up with really interesting angles on things that hadn't been considered - process vessel jet fires and flame impingement, etc. in weird ways. Fire protection was a constant concern and equipment design and instrumentation could be modified two or three times even, through the course of Front End Engineering Design and into Detailed Design and then Construction Phases.
As our businesses "electrify" and Li batteries are now spreading everywhere it may behoove us to think a bit about any potential downsides such as "fire" from these things. There is much work going on in Australia and the UK currently looking at "fire" safety of LI battery cars, bikes and scooters and even computers. Attached is a link to a fire safety video from a UK fire safety conference (once you get past the silly conference ads) which talks about some of the research going on right now regarding building safety. I must admit I haven't really given battery "fires" much thought in the past, but that might have to change - I wonder about the "fire" safety of banks and banks of batteries on charge indoors if anything every did go wrong and there had been mechanical damage to a battery or battery pack in the course of a previous days work. Maybe as we go forward, this is an issue that TCIA needs to keep an eye on? Dunno. There are Australian YouTube videos on the subject of car battery "fires" as well, some of them quite troubling. Maybe we need to go into this electrification transition with eyes wide open. Cheers all. Stay safe out there.

Addenda: On thinking about it more, possible physical damage to batteries in treework is not entirely hypothetical - there is a Buzz thread somewhere on Li battery damage citing dropped batteries, Husqvarna battery clips giving way after a waggle on a stem (me) etc. And as battery packs get really bigger (I'm thinking battery blowers and such here) and energy density gets even higher "fire" potential may get even bigger. For large business, example some of the projects I worked in, companies would have a $4M or so deductible on their insurance policies (peanuts in the scheme of things). For a small business though, such an incident might be business ending. And I must admit I never considered a residential "fire" from charging batteries in a garage under the kids bedrooms. Just have a think.

Addenda II: the word "fire" is in quotation marks because these thermal runaways are not actually fires (at least until the gas explosion down the road - see the videos) - it's actually a runaway exothermic chemical reaction that's going on with HCN and other really toxic gasses produced, not just "normal" combustion products (if we were thinking about it like wood smoke or something). Hence the automatic use of supplied air respiratory protection for the firefighters in every instance. Which leads me to also wonder about the residual toxic metals pollution left after the battery situation is attended to (like Notre Dame Cathedral's roof fire and the Pb pollution of Paris neighbourhoods).
 
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Lots of good points.

Hopefully LiIon is temporary and we'll be to something safer soon.

I've seen video of 4 firefighters putting a special blanket over a whole EV engulfed in flame. We might need modest size versions of that in the mean time.
 
Are there any documented incidences that we know of that involved these kinds of lithium batteries? I certainly do see some hazard in a cracked, worn out, frayed battery connections… especially when canola oil gets involved.

One thing I would also consider, to temper the potential fear of lithium fires, is looking at it from the lens of how many fires are started from small engines that are powered by gas. I imagine those are fairly routine and have a higher risk of causing fires than small li batteries.
 
Stumpsprouts said:
Are there any documented incidences that we know of that involved these kinds of lithium batteries? I certainly do see some hazard in a cracked, worn out, frayed battery connections… especially when canola oil gets involved.

One thing I would also consider, to temper the potential fear of lithium fires, is looking at it from the lens of how many fires are started from small engines that are powered by gas. I imagine those are fairly routine and have a higher risk of causing fires than small li batteries.
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I think for me (as per the addenda) once I thought more about it (somewhat under the influence of single malt) there was the possibility of a dropped or clunked battery making it back to the shop, charging overnight for the next day and that night kaa-poof ("the incident scenario"). The presenter makes the point that batteries that are charged to 100% are the most dangerous or seem to have the most incidents.
Have a look at the whole movie - the computer battery that took off was amazing, as was the video of the e-scooter battery runaway in the London subway - the folks coughing from the toxic cloud (HF and HCN in the vapor cloud - not smoke) was scary too. Incidents are accumulating all over the world as we read this and London is having about two e-runaway reactions a week (including their fleet of e-busses). I have read of fire crews responding to car battery incidents (I'm not calling them fires anymore) not being safe in supplied air and normal turnout gear, but suffering asthma and health effects after trying to fight these chemical runaways.
I watched the movie a couple of times and it was an eyeopener for me anyway. I also doubt this is alarmism - the presenter's research is affiliated with Newcastle University (an eminent fire safety engineering school in the world) and he also works with DNV (Det Norske Veritas) from OSLO, one of the best fire safety engineering/ risk management company's in the world. First class stuff. Big blower backpacks have lotsa juice in them. Be interesting to see the incidence of power tool battery fires. But should we wait till the fires are plenty? Dunno, something to begin thinking about maybe for TCIA to consider for a "standard practice"?
 
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These li batteries are no joke as far as fire potential. Made the mistake of bending a very small pouch battery and it very quickly started smoking and was too hot to touch. Small meaning from a vape pen, small. Thinking I’d like to have a fire resistant metal shroud of some sort for when I charge all my Milwaukee batteries. I could easily see a saw battery taking a hit and some internal damage.
 
On ebike sites some of the guys who are older hands and tinkerers take a big ammo can like for 20 or 30mm ammo and drill holes in it. Then charge battery inside that in a less flammable area. A run away reaction can have at it, not explode, and not throw flames far enough to start other combustibles.
 
There is no doubt that lithium batteries present a new and different fire hazard than gasoline, but I'm not convinced in any way that it is worse. One of the great things about battery tools is that volts are volts, and if/when battery technology changes and improves, new and safer battery chemistry will take it's place, and be safer and longer lasting.
 
At work we started trialing electric tools a few years ago (all Greenworks so far) so I've got a dozen 80v batteries laying around. The infrastructure for tool storage and staff facilities was built in the 70s and often repurposed from other needs so we've run into issues with insufficient charging capacity and few options for well-ventilated climate-controlled spaces to charge batteries. We have gas cabinets for our flammables but we don't have dedicated fireproof battery racks, I should make a point of that to the joint health and safety committee.
 
The Firestone tire of phones. Talking to folks at the transfer station they’ve brought up Li fires from people not disposing e-waste etc properly. Near impossible to put out according to them. Our disposable/planned-obsolescence culture depresses the fuck out of me.
 
Serf Life said:
The Firestone tire of phones. Talking to folks at the transfer station they’ve brought up Li fires from people not disposing e-waste etc properly. Near impossible to put out according to them. Our disposable/planned-obsolescence culture depresses the fuck out of me.
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At least people seem to be recycling batteries so far. The rest of the crap that they sell….not so much. Never mind the tiny amount that is actually recyclable I keep thinking that retailers ought to be required to take back all of the obsolete, broken, and useless crap they sell. Not hard to find furniture, electronics, tires, etc etc etc dump3d along the road almost everywhere I’ve been.
 
bobs yeruncle said:
At work we started trialing electric tools a few years ago (all Greenworks so far) so I've got a dozen 80v batteries laying around. The infrastructure for tool storage and staff facilities was built in the 70s and often repurposed from other needs so we've run into issues with insufficient charging capacity and few options for well-ventilated climate-controlled spaces to charge batteries. We have gas cabinets for our flammables but we don't have dedicated fireproof battery racks, I should make a point of that to the joint health and safety committee.
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That's why I brought this up - keep at it. Not sure what "standard practice" for safe storage and charging multiple batteries etc. will become in the future but maybe we need to think about thermal runaway and the gasses/ heavy metals produced more. Cheers.
 
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The lack of recyclability, combined with how much less effective they are than what we already had makes me not want to buy much of this tech until its sognoficantly improved. I am off grid, and I use lead acid batteries to run my house, as everything but the plastic housing is actually recyclable. I certainly dont want lead batteries in my climbing saw, but if the current state of things is my only option, I would rather hold out as long as I can.
 
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