series_hybrid
1 mW
Its been well-known for quite a while that LFP/LiFePO4 "Lithium Iron Phosphate" batteries are inherently fire-safe. They are the "go to" chemistry for RV solar-panel systems, and the starter battery for small piston-engine aircraft.
Other chemistries are "safe" when the pack is built with a high standard of quality and the BMS/Charger do not malfunction (causing an overcharge above 4.2V per cell). However, I was at a fire class today and professional firemen that teach classes did not know about any differences between chemistries, and could not tell me which type of extinguisher should be used on a "lithium battery fire".
The reason for my curiosity is that the facility I work at switched last year from lead-acid 12V batteries to LFP 12V for moving targets for shooters.
The apocryphal stories about lithium fires are often about the cheapest brands that are LiPo/LiCo for RC packs from Hobby King. Even the packs using 18650-cells are considered suspicious if they are poorly constructed and counterfeit cells are used.
The large packs for Tesla/Ford/ Rivian are usually Lithium NMC/NCA (some Tesla's use LFP). Fires are rare, BUT...google can show that there have been some (Fiskar had 16 go up in flames at a lot that flooded during hurricane Sandy, and about 50 of new Rivians just went up Aug 24 at the Illinois factory).
The low-priced BYD Seagull car has a short-range version that uses sodium-ion, and no nickel or Cobalt. Sodium appears to be a desirable chemistry for stationary power-banks for grid-electricity, since they will not have as much range-per-volume as other chemistries. They will be slightly cheaper than the others, and there is theoretically no limit to how many can be made by readily-available materials.
Sulfur-Ion batteries also do not use "NMC" (Nickel, Manganese, Cobalt). Sulfur-Ion uses an inorganic salt as an electrolyte, and is claimed to be fire-safe. This plus the fact that sulfur is noticeably lighter per volume (compared to lithium), they may prove to be popular in the new wave of light aircraft, along with the light-weight polymer electrodes from Store-Dot.
Tesla has announced that they are working on an aluminum-Ion chemistry. I normally disregard such announcements, but Tesla has been accurate about such announcements, typically resulting from experiments by Jeff Dahn's research team at Dalhousie University. Fire-safety has been a desired feature in all future developments, but there has been no specific announcement about inherent fire-safety of the new Aluminum-Ion type.
Fire-safety is something that has been pursued in all of these development programs, but PR hype may not always be accurate, so I am starting this thread as a place to park any info I find about which ones can be abused and still survive.
Other chemistries are "safe" when the pack is built with a high standard of quality and the BMS/Charger do not malfunction (causing an overcharge above 4.2V per cell). However, I was at a fire class today and professional firemen that teach classes did not know about any differences between chemistries, and could not tell me which type of extinguisher should be used on a "lithium battery fire".
The reason for my curiosity is that the facility I work at switched last year from lead-acid 12V batteries to LFP 12V for moving targets for shooters.
The apocryphal stories about lithium fires are often about the cheapest brands that are LiPo/LiCo for RC packs from Hobby King. Even the packs using 18650-cells are considered suspicious if they are poorly constructed and counterfeit cells are used.
The large packs for Tesla/Ford/ Rivian are usually Lithium NMC/NCA (some Tesla's use LFP). Fires are rare, BUT...google can show that there have been some (Fiskar had 16 go up in flames at a lot that flooded during hurricane Sandy, and about 50 of new Rivians just went up Aug 24 at the Illinois factory).
The low-priced BYD Seagull car has a short-range version that uses sodium-ion, and no nickel or Cobalt. Sodium appears to be a desirable chemistry for stationary power-banks for grid-electricity, since they will not have as much range-per-volume as other chemistries. They will be slightly cheaper than the others, and there is theoretically no limit to how many can be made by readily-available materials.
Sulfur-Ion batteries also do not use "NMC" (Nickel, Manganese, Cobalt). Sulfur-Ion uses an inorganic salt as an electrolyte, and is claimed to be fire-safe. This plus the fact that sulfur is noticeably lighter per volume (compared to lithium), they may prove to be popular in the new wave of light aircraft, along with the light-weight polymer electrodes from Store-Dot.
Tesla has announced that they are working on an aluminum-Ion chemistry. I normally disregard such announcements, but Tesla has been accurate about such announcements, typically resulting from experiments by Jeff Dahn's research team at Dalhousie University. Fire-safety has been a desired feature in all future developments, but there has been no specific announcement about inherent fire-safety of the new Aluminum-Ion type.
Fire-safety is something that has been pursued in all of these development programs, but PR hype may not always be accurate, so I am starting this thread as a place to park any info I find about which ones can be abused and still survive.
