Lithium-ion battery storage is one of the most exciting new and innovative energy options changing the energy landscape, but it also poses some unique challenges for fire safety design. Dr Rui Sun, one of Hydrock’s leading fire safety experts, explores how to keep your building safe without compromising the benefits of this new smart energy solution.
Driven by the worldwide changing energy landscape, the development of smarter energy storage is accelerating. A smart energy strategy presents a brilliant opportunity to access cheaper, cleaner and more reliable energy for businesses and homes by allowing consumers (domestic and commercial) to store energy to access as needed, avoiding reliance on the grid. The commercial benefits of this are vast.
From a technology perspective, in the current market, the most popular accumulator is the lithium-ion battery. It is lightweight, rechargeable and stores a lot of energy in relation to its size for a reasonably long period without losing voltage. More importantly, thanks to the use of lithium-ion technology, the cost of energy storage has been reduced by 50%.
However, energy accumulation systems using lithium-ion batteries present unique challenges for fire safety design within buildings. They pose a new fire hazard that could be difficult to control and has no current UK regulation.
Fire risks associated with the use of lithium-ion batteries
Lithium-ion cells consist of two electrodes: negative and positive, with an ion-conducting, flammable electrolyte and separator in between, housed in cabinets or equivalent configurations that protect them.
Any damage to the battery structure, mainly the separator, could casuse an internal short-circuit that can lead to ‘thermal runaway’, an unstoppable chain reaction resulting in rapid temperature increase and sudden energy release within the battery system. This could eventually lead to a catastrophic rupturing of battery cells and result in the remaining material burning at a very high temperature (over 8000C).
Extinguishing fires caused by battery thermal runaway presents a challenge for firefighting. The combustion of lithium-ion cells produces oxygen which actually contributes to fire growth. The lithium-ion battery can also be seemingly reignited days or weeks after the initial extinguish.
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