Putting out lithium ion batteries with plain water in a short time
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- Опубликовано: 18 мар 2023
- A presentation at a Swedish Fire Officers Associations conference. It is a presentation about a Swedish Civil Contingencies Agency project where we demonstrated that it is possible to put out lithium ion batteries in battery packs by flowing water into the packs.
The results will be the input to create a method that will make it possible to deal with EV fires in a safe and efficient way. 
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Thanks! It seems to me that car manufacturers could install standardized one-way ports at various points that could be used to directly inject water throughout the pack without needing to forcibly penetrate it.
That is spot on! If they did that we would not have the EV fire discussion that we have today. Renault actually has that on all their EVs. An opening in the battery pack that opens up in fire and makes it easy for firefighters to spray water into the opening.
@@UtkikenRescue oh yes we would,
Fremantle highway and how would you deal with fire in one EV within others EV in six storeys high 621 car park in Sege Park
all around the world we have car garages under tower blocks that you have hard time getting the small size ambulance into.
problem with EV they have away more than 15 minutes ahead starts before you get the call. this is not a airbag moment, this is
the work and study that should have been done before any battery factory was build.
Like always we humans are playing the game of catchup
now material scientists from Duke University have used high-throughput computational models to predict and build two new magnetic materials from the atom up, this what we should have done and make safer batteries before rushing into EV
we should have start with hydrogen and methane cars.
as that would have push for a update power girds for the plants that would make hydrogen and methane.
from hydrogen and methane cars to Hybrid electric/hydrogen and methane
and with safe battery tech in hand, we would go to EV with better power girds.
people are also forgetting there are a lot of fire station around the world manned by volunteer firefighter,
that are at work or sleeping at home, when fire starts
Yes but this is where mice can enter into that area too and stat chewing away at the wires. New problemo!
@@zeeek1 Read again ;)
@@UtkikenRescue If Renault has it, Nissan has it as well I suppose? Also, is there a standardized way the automakers communicate those things (similar to the rescue card i.e.)?
Water injection port in every EV. Possibly water/coolant reserve onboard spreading into pack may delay early runaway and provide for escape time.
So build the battery packs with a coolant injection port for fire fighters. Injecting CO2 into packs would be best.
It turns out that gaseous extinguishing agents are not very good for battery fires. There are examples when some gases have worked, but the success rate is much smaller than for water.
CO2 dosent work
What do car manufactures know about the fire problem in a vehicle they were allowed to develop without checks and balances from regulatory agencies like the CPSC or the FTC in the U.S.? Aren't the car manufactures the root cause of the fire problem that they, themselves are responsible for having engineered?
I greet you with respect.
Unfortunately, my English is not perfect, but I hope it is understandable.
I have been researching lithium battery fires for 3 years.
If we extinguish with water, we create additional toxic acid, which is seriously harmful to human health.
For example Hydrofluoric acid.... It is a solution of hydrogen fluoride in water.
This removes calcium from the human body and later causes death due to heart failure
There are many gases are released which can explode in high pressure, for example Methane, ethane, ethylene, hydrogen fluoride and hydrogen chloride. These gases are additional danger If the ventilation windows does not open due to a technical error.
If the temperature rises in the battery pack but there is no smoke yet, there is a high chance that it will explode.
The cells of the modules that were not in direct contact with the fire will be wet, causing more short circuits. If water enters the cell, lithium reacts violently and explosively to the water.
Lithium ion batterys can burst into flames again even after 2-3-4 days.
Unfortunately, I've seen a flame underwater from a battery module that was submerged in water.
Thanks for your research.
Thanks for your thoughts. About hydrofluoric acid we have had a research project here in Sweden regarding that. It was a very thourough research and it concluded that the regular firefighting gear is more than enough to protect from that.
The gases that can explode is a serious risk that we need to deal with. If there are flames already, the explosion risk is not very big, but if unburned smoke can collect somewhere it is important to make a risk assessment and treat the incident something like a gasleak of flammable gas. I believe the position of the vehicle will decide if it is possible to make an intervention or not.
We have measured the waters conductivity in the battery pack and it is not very conductive. That means that the risk of additional short circuitsdue to water are small. But of course a damaged battery from fire will have new electrical connections where they are a fire hazard by heating up the batteries and therefore maybe create reignitions. Here I think the vehicle industry should step up and take their responsibility and have an organisation to dissassemble and deenergize burned and crashed batteries within some predetermined time so they dont present a fire danger any more.
About lithium reacting with water, that is not true for lithium ion batteries. The lithium is in form of ions and if there would be some small amount of lithium metal in the batteries that is only in the not damaged cells. That means that water will not be able to rech that lithium. In the damaged/burned cells all the lithium metal will be combusted during the fire.
Finally, I have seen the flame underwater as well. But that is not a problem from a firefighting perspective since the water is used to cool the adjacent cells so they dont start to combust. In the cases I have seen with fire under water the battery cells has been in an enclosure, so that they dont get cooled by the water they are in.
Thanks for great questions and thoughts.
This is fascinating to see. It reinforces some observations I've had regarding EV fires. Most notably that you don't need 5 tonnes of water to put out an EV and you're never going to get as good a job done putting out the fire until you flood the pack itself. Also demonstrates the cutting extinguisher to be extremely effective. But I don't think that's a complete solution since we still have impact damage that may involve substantial warping and consequent drainage of any flooding of the packs. It would be really cool if we had some sort of phase change chemical that could be injected into a pack in liquid state (ideally using the cutting extinguisher), survive the temperatures, and then set and seal out any oxygen. Such a system could also address the reignition problem as well.
Yes it is very interesting. I agree that it would be optimal to find something that would stick and keep it cool even if there are large holes.
About our tests I think it is an answer to some occasions, and not to others. So like in any other firefighting situation there is a need for a skilled firefighter or commander that can choose tool wisely.
I was at a test in France were we burned a bus battery with an aluminium casing that melted away. I thought the cutting extinguisher would not be able to handle that, but after flooding continuosly for a couple of minutes the battery pack filled up well. So I believe patience and a continuous flow of water sometimes can be a solution when there are larger holes.
Yes it certainly is interesting to see that we start learn things that can bust some of the initial myths created by the vehicle industrys, in my opinion, bad advice. I totally agree that we have much more to learn and your thoughts sounds very correct. I have been thinking about what would happen if we used AVD extinguishing agent instead of water, or Hydrex. Both are agents that are environmentally sound and sticks to vertical surfaces, cooling very good. On the downside for them could be that their viscosity is higher than water and might not flow as well in the packs.
Can manufacturers provide a convenient location and means of connecting a fire hose into the battery cooling system? A relief valve to allow outflow would prevent a buildup of pressure. The new Zeekre good battery is designed to be waterproof. Tesla cybertruck has a positive pressure so perhaps the air valve can also be used to provide an outside water source?
In your experience would a custom spray bar, providing high pressure mist, positioned underneath the battery offer enough cooling effect? Such a spray bar could be deployed to fire agencies and used immediately with little additional training and at a low cost?
@@mickjoebills There are a couple manufacturers who do have flood ports. I can’t remember which but they aren’t perfect because a collision could damage the ports too.
@@captainotto @mickjoebills I believe you are thinking about the Renault firemans access. It is a brilliant idea, that unfortunately might have some flaws in it. The problem being that the smoke (flammable gas) produced when there is a smoking thermal runaway have produced a couple of serious explosions. Would be great if it vented to the outside and not into the cabin I think.
Hello Per Ola
It’s great what you are doing! Thank you for all the new knowledge and new possibilities of putting out ev fires.
I’ve one question: did you consider making new short circuits after flooding the battery pack? Did you observe any bad influence on battery after flooding it? For example reignite of the battery?
Greetings from Poland ☺️
Hello Maciek,
We made to few tests to make any certain findings about short circuits. However the water that was left in the packs did not remove much voltage during the days we had between the fires and the analysis. The damages made to the battery can create short circuits even if the water does not. So it is important to consider short circuits and reignition.
Hello from ST.Hellens Oregon!!😁😉
Perhaps even having something like voids/channels between the cells to help the coolant flow between the cells and take on any excess heat that would otherwise make it to adjacent cells? Though I don't know if that clashes with the design of the batteries.
Regarding the firefighter becoming a part of the circuit by touching the body of the car, could one other potential risk be that the leakage of the electrolyte around the car (assuming the battery already has some holes that just happen to be inaccessible for the purpose of pumping water into) could result in that electrolyte connecting their body to the car? Certainly seems unlikely, especially since the electrolyte is flammable and likely would burn out before it gets to conduct electricity, but it's just one extra way a circuit could form that I thought of
Yes, it would be perfect if manufacturers made a design that helped distributing the water.
About the electrolyte, that is not leaking out just like you say. It is such a small amount per cell, and when the cell ignites it will burn away.
would love to be able to see a NMC/NCM vs LFP battery in this type of test (I assume these are NMC/NCM)
Yes that would certainly be interesting. I would guess that there will be no big difference since we are not putting out the fire in the cell but rather cooling the not yet burned cells. And the temperature when we reach a thermal runaway are in both cases well above boiling point of water. that means that water will have a similar cooling effect in both cases. I believe the physical design of the battery pack and if and how water can flow is a more important factor than the battery chemistry.
Do you have the video of the "complete car" battery fire? I would be very interested in seeing and showing it!
Unfortunately the car company that sponsored us with the brand new EV did not want any images from the tests be shared since they thought it might be bad PR for them. Personally I would think it would be the opposite, good PR that they work seriously with fire safety. But unfortunately it was not my call.
@Scarastef, I was observing some tests this week that was successful again. And they were filmed. NIPV in Netherland will release both film and report about the tests.
@@perolamalmquist9043 thanks a lot for the heads-up! I will check it out as soon as it comes out!
So this is not a set patented method then and they are still working on a set procedure.
That is correct. There are several tools that can achieve water into the battery pack. Those tools are in some cases patented, but to get water into the pack is not a patent. Each tool manufacturer needs to develop a safe method for their tool.
Good evening, thank You for a very informative video and precious experience. I would like to ask, I am working as an electrical engineer and designer of installations for houses and commerce (Europe), about practical experience of using fire extinguishers within highly automated households with heat pumps, PV installations, home automation, lots of notebooks... I request from an architect a fire protection project, when designing electrical installation for building permit does not usually require too much considerations as whole house is considered as one "fire segment / zone". However as an electrical engineer I always comment or recommend placing fire extinguishers also at such homes (although formally not required). Usually CO2 was used (halons not eco, water risky fro electric appliances...). So now to the question: I see that special vermiculite extinguishers pop up as a way of handling lithium battery fires, which release steam and create isolating crust over the object. Do you have practical experience with them, or would you practically recommend such device for laic persons? Price tag is at premium, 6kg device is around 300 EUR. Thank you.
I have tested those extinguishers and they do a really god job when the agent is allowed to reach where it is of use. i.e. on and inbetween the burning and nonburning cells. I think the question to ask is if the persons using them will be able to reach the burning cells at the right time with the extinguisher.
@@UtkikenRescue Good evening, thank You for Your feedback. Yes, I am afraid, that without proper skills and hands-on training there is no practical chance for ordinary people to tackle anything larger than mobile phone or maybe notebook :/
What do you have to do to treat the water after it's been in contact with the burning battery?
In our tests it was collected and driven to the recycling/treatment plant and they took care of it. As you saw in the videos it was not much water. In Sweden we have not yet gotten to a good system for collecting and disposing of it in real life inicidents, but we are working to get there. Also to understand when it is useful to collect it and not.
Why not to build a "bottomless water pool around car" (supported by water filled walls) and fill it with water above lvl of battery?? Yes it takes more water but its easy and safe!
the biggest problem with water is freezing, and the pressure that might put on batteries... and actually causing problems.
There are some countries that are working with routines like that, and companies providing equipment for it. As I say in the video, there will be battery designs that cant be extinguished with interior water, and for them it could be a good solution.
you just need to take away energy and control fire/smoke spread -- water pool will help@@UtkikenRescue
Just a simple question, how many EV cars have actually been saved in any EV car fires around the world ?
I know of a handful real fires and maybe 35 testfires in full EVs. The problem is that Tesla sold in the "it is impossible to put out an EV" so no one really tried to get it working until Renault installed their firemans access and then when we started doing our tests in Sweden. Now there are several places in the world that have started both tests and implementing it for real fires.
How do you expect firefighters to access the battery compartment while it's contained inside the chassis of the vehicle? Your tests appear to be in open parking lot in an exposed battery case. This is not a real world sceario.
Chief Hughes
Battalion 1 (retrired)
Chicago FD
Exactly, whats the point of even trying. In battery storage the motto is let it burn, what is the point of putting water on it when you risk further agitation…
Best Chief Hughes. There are tools that work very well to get the water inside the battery pack. I have been involved in testing a couple of them on real world EVs, and it is not hard to get the water in. First put out the fire like a regular car fire and then fill the battery pack. It 7s rwally not that difficult, but of course need the correct training and tools, just like any fire.
@@tenkarausa5294 the point is to handle EVs when they are in a position where you dont want to let them burn, or if you want to save the environment by stopping the fire before everything is burned out. I think we have cracked the code of how to put them out. Then there will always be tactical considerations for what is the best option depending on the situation.
What are your thoughts on sodium-ion batteries?
I dont know enough about them to have a strong opinion, my thoughts are that many companies say they have made safer batteries than lithium ions, but when testing them in conditions outside the companys testing conditions they might have properties that not always are as good as they say.
But I am a firm believer that we are working in the right direction and learning more and more and that fire safety is starting to be a concern for manufacturers as well.
Sodium just as all alkali metals react to water on contact.
Sodium and potassium release even more energy on contact to water as they have more charge potential per diatomic particle.
So you get more explosive booms with potassium and sodium.
You can check it out cutting a piece of hard butter like sodium and popping that puppy in water.
ruclips.net/video/5UsRiPOFLjk/видео.html&ab_channel=EatsTooMuchJam
Why do you use the unit Gallons if you work for the Swedish government?
I use both liters per minut and gallons per minute so US colleagues also can get a grip about how little water is necessary.
The water cool and dilute the electrolyte
What a joke. Just a few of many issues:
- He never mentions what battery type (chemistry, brand etc), just the number of kWh.
- The "method" involves cutting holes in battery packs and injecting water directly. In all the EV fire videos I've seen this would be COMPLETELY impractical.
- The testing was on isolated battery packs sitting on concrete, not in an actual EV. He mentioned a "whole EV", but provided no information, photos or video. I wonder why?
- It was never explained how firefighters could access the battery (let alone make holes in it) when it's surrounded by car body and there's a raging inferno.
- They used thermal cameras to determine the hot spots and where to make the holes. This wouldn't be possible in a real EV fire.
Thanks for your nice start of your comments. Not!
I will answer your comments anyway since I think they are good.
- The chemistry is interesting, but not really for our experiments since it is not the battery itself we extinguished. We cooled the adjacent cells to a level that they did not ignite. The battery pack and modules physical design would be more important than the chemistry.
- There is a myth that it is impractical, impossible and dangerous to make holes in batterypacks. But we showed that it is possible in some situations. Maybe not all since the vehicle logation and the possibilities to approach the vehicle can make it dangerous, and then it should not be done.
- A car fire is not a raging inferno. It might look like that when you dont know anything about firefighting, but it is something that firefighters deal with all the time and dont find intimidating. So what we did when putting out the full EV was to first observe where we had jet flames from the battery pack and spend a couple of minutes putting out the majority of the car fire, then we used a Cobra cutting extinguisher to, with a water jet, cut a hole in the floor plate and into the battery pack and at the same time get water into the battery pack. It is an easy operation. Then we flooded the battery with 60 liters per minut a couple of minutes until smoke and fire disappeared while the other firefighter continued to put out the fire in the rest of the car.
- Yes, a thermal imager was a good tool on the real EV fire that we put out. It led us to the correct area to make the hole in. But it wasn´t really necessary to be very accurate with were the hole was made since the water flowed in the battery pack and stopped the fire evan at places far away from the hole.
I will be happy to answer more comments and questions if you have that. But please try some politeness even if you are on the internet. It makes life so much better if we are nice to each other.
Oh, and the reason we could not show the whole EV was that the sponsor of that brand new EV did not want their vehicles to show up on internet on fire, even if it was intentional testing. I wish that we could have shown that video because it really showed how undramatic it was to extinguish it. An EV fully involved where the fire started in the battery pack that has burned for 15 minutes, and ten minutes later the fire was out.
@@UtkikenRescue so you did extensive testing on an actual EV, but are unable to provide any evidence of said testing? Pardon me if we don't just take your word for all of your claims with no evidence...
@@michaelnoble2432 As I said in the video I was employed by the Swedish Civil Contingencies Agency during the tests and the project was run by that same government agency together with some national industry partners. Here is a link to the report in Swedish, were we also mentions the full EV burn. rib.msb.se/filer/pdf/30340.pdf It is to be released in English in the beginning of this year.
You mentioned that the questions you raised were just a few of all the questions you had. I will be happy to answer the rest of them as well if you want that. I am not claiming that it is a method that will work all the time, but I would say that we have been mislead to believe that EV fires are impossible to put out all the time. Next step is to learn when the method is working and not working, and in Sweden the government Agency is about to release a guidance were this method is one way of dealing with EV fires when it is safe to use it.
@@UtkikenRescue thanks for the link - I'll read the report when it's available in English. It doesn't seem to cover the testing of the whole EV though, which was my main concern in my previous comments. Testing a battery pack sitting by itself on concrete is VERY different to a real EV fire.
And STILL no information on the battery chemistry (NMC, LFP / LiFePO4 etc). You suggested it didn't matter, but this goes against EVERYTHING I've learned about battery fires (ie, the cell chemistry makes a HUGE difference).
Toxic not only to the consumer, but the underaged miner as well. 🤑🤑🤑
Why bother with water, why not class D material?
I mean... water burns lithium.
Why don't we just dump gasoline on house fires LOL!
That is one of the big misunderstandings with lithium ion battery fires. That water is a problem for them. Water burns lithium in the form of metal, but not in the form of ions that it is in the batteries. So water is a cheap and efficient extinguishing agent to handle this kind of fires.
An unbelievable false flag.
No car, in a very open area, separated from everything, no fierce flames when compared to real EV car fires and the car manufacturer who supplied the battery packs, did not want the public to see their car catch fire and witness the true extent of damage that would result.
One pack of batteries tested at a time !!! The packs in EV cars virtually touch each other and looking at the size of the packs here, there would be 4 or 6 or even more packs on the floor in a real EV.
Try swinging an axe or pick inside a car, impossible. There are front and rear seats taking up the majority of the interior area on top of the batteries as well, so there is only a small portion of the floor visible in the foot wells to be able to swing anything at anyway.
Before the responders even get to the car, the interior would have been on fire for a while, with extreme flames and toxic fumes making a very dangerous situation impossible.
The best and only hope is to stop the fire escalating to other cars or property nearby.
No Dave, not a false flag.
I had the opportunity to overlook tests in this week where a Nederland Research Agency made the same full scale EV fire tests that we were not allowed to show. And with the same result. Two EVs with 100 % SOC, vehicles fully involved and they were extinguished by this method. Also, I have been involved in the Swedish Civil Contingencies Agencies work to make a fire brigade guidance based on our results. It was released last week.
Ok so it is very well known that lithium reacts quite violently with water then how on earth you try to extinguish lithium batteries with water?!?
You are right about lithium metal, but the lithium in the batteries are mostly ions. Think of it like you have sodium ions in salt water, and sodium is also a combustible metal.
Also, putting out the battery fires with water is actually not putting out the burning cells. Instead we cool the not burnt cells so they don't ignite.
@@perolamalmquist9043 the main ingredient of lithium ion batteries is lithium metal from which you get lithium ions. Therefore, if a single cell is broken and water or even moisture is getting inside the cell it makes lithium react and burst into the flames damaging instantly cells next to it. The only way to extinguish the lithium battery is to use some powder or co2. Also the design of the battery pack should be done in a way that it would prevent fire from damaging neighbouring cells. Water is not enough to prevent other cells from being damaged. And if other cells gets damaged then water will be already there to react with lithium. I think better would be to inject some sort of gluey insulator that would insulate the cells from each other and prevent individual cells from any damage.
@severyn184 I have put out full size car battery packs with 100% State of charge with water. The lithium metal is not a problem for lithium ion batteries.
@@severyn184 Here are a couple of videos where we put out lithium ion batteries with water. ruclips.net/video/4xjDdmv8urk/видео.html
The Dunning-Kruger effect is also very well known, yet it hasn't stopped you from thinking your high school chemistry knowledge outweighs the experimental data from a literal expert on putting out battery fires.