Lithium Ion Battery Fires – Detection & Dealing With Them
Lithium Ion Battery Fires – Detection & Dealing With Them
As part of the world’s continuing growth in dependency on lithium ion batteries, whether they be in cars, mobile devices or indirectly on energy storage facilities and farms – the fire risk of them must be considered. Not only for the direct risk associated, but the fact that when they malfunction, “thermal runaway” occurs which can lead to extended fire burn times of days, if not weeks.
The use of lithium ion batteries in energy storage systems alone is set to rise over the coming years with more and more renewable energy source technology coming online.
So in a nutshell, until the technology dictates otherwise – lithium ion in one form or another is here to stay.
Why are Lithium Ion Batteries Such a Massive Fire Risk?
The fire risk is not in the battery materials itself. It does of course have an inherent fire risk in its structure, but the issue comes when the batteries constituents start to degrade and produce off-gasses. These gasses are massively combustible and makes extinguishing any fire very difficult as it makes the fire self-sustaining.
Going back to the fire triangle, for a fire to be extinguished, one of the following steps has to happen:
- Taking away the oxygen to feed combustion.
- Taking away heat from the source of the fire.
- Taking away fuel from the source of the fire.
In a lithium ion off-gassing fire, none of these are possible as the off-gases exacerbate the fire, feeding it and making it very difficult to control.
How to Prevent Lithium Ion Battery Fires
A lithium-ion battery will only catch fire if abused, this can be done in a couple of different ways:
- Mechanical abuse – the battery is physically attacked, so whether deliberate or not, this can cause the battery to produce off-gases.
- Electrical abuse – the battery is subject to defective charging by a malfunctioning management/charging system.
- Thermal abuse – perhaps the battery enclosure is too hot.
How to Detect a Lithium Ion Fire
Have a look at the below graph:
As shown by the graph, by the time smoke or heat is produced in a large enough quantity to detect, off-gassing has already begun. ASD (or VESDA) may pick up this level of smoke, but it is not guaranteed.
However, there is a better way for detecting the off-gasses before they are produced in big volumes…
The Johnson Controls Lithium Ion Risk Prevention System
The system can be seen on YouTube here: Lithium-Ion Risk Prevention System
Sensing off-gasses reliably allows you to do something about it – whether you want to trigger an inerting gas system, or just alarm and shut off the battery management system.
Lithium Ion Fire Protection & Suppression with Sovereign Fire & Security
If you have more questions on suppressing lithium ion fires, please don’t hesitate to get in touch with our team today. Here at Sovereign Extinguishing, we are the UK’s leading experts in fire extinguishing installations and servicing and would be more than happy to provide you with more information. We have an extensive and successful history of experience in designing, installing and commissioning fire suppression systems into a wide range of applications.
If you would like to read the recommendations issued by the Fire Industry Association, please visit their website.
See more: The Importance of Room Integrity