Fredrik Larsson, Petra Andersson, Per Blomqvist, Bengt-Erik Mellander
2017 · Scientific Reports
Abstract Lithium-ion battery fires generate intense heat and considerable amounts of gas and smoke. Although the emission of toxic gases can be a larger threat than the heat, the knowledge of such emissions is limited. This paper presents quantitative measurements of heat release and fluoride gas emissions during battery fires for seven different types of commercial lithium-ion batteries. The results have been validated using two independent measurement techniques and show that large amounts of hydrogen fluoride (HF) may be generated, ranging between 20 and 200 mg/Wh of nominal battery energy capacity. In addition, 15–22 mg/Wh of another potentially toxic gas, phosphoryl fluoride (POF 3 ), was measured in some of the fire tests. Gas emissions when using water mist as extinguishing agent were also investigated. Fluoride gas emission can pose a serious toxic threat and the results are crucial findings for risk assessment and management, especially for large Li-ion battery packs.
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More info: https://www.nature.com/articles/s41598-017-09784-z Edit to add: > The electrolyte in a lithium-ion battery is flammable and generally contains lithium hexafluorophosphate (LiPF6) or other Li-salts containing fluorine.
What nobody talks about is that much of the lithium electrolyte in lithium ion batteries is in the chemical form of lithium hexafluorophosphate (LiPF6). Burning produces nontrivial amounts of hydrogen fluoride and clouds of hydrofluoric acid. In the short term, these are horrifically toxic (reactive). They'll bond with just about anything, including etching glass. The impact on living tissue is nightmarish and unlike some other strong acids, protracted because it absorbs rapidly through skin and starts substituting things in your biochemistry. There are also a variety of other excitingly unstable fluorinated compounds floating around. I have a suspicion that at some point…
we're going to stop talking about "Hey it's a fire that won't go out, we have to use too much water, our tanker trucks aren't equipped for this" and start talking about "Hey it's a fire that boils off what is very nearly a chemical weapon. Evacuate a mile downwind and let it burn". And then we're going to ban the more fire-prone chemistries in stationary and vehicular applications. What event is going to trigger that? I think the most likely thing is a mass casualty event in a deep tunnel traffic jam where the pileup ends up igniting. Obligatory reading: https://www.science.org/content/blog-post/things-i-won-t-tou... And on this specific threat: https://www.nature.com/articles/s41598-017-09784-z
https://www.nature.com/articles/s41598-017-09784-z Many batteries have LiPF6 electrolytes, so HF is the big one when they combust. And of course the most famous and common battery chemistry is still LiCo - so you've got Lithium salts and Cobalt, which you don't love to see get in ground water. They're not too bad when they don't burn, but once they've burned, all bets are off - there are a lot of nasty byproducts.
The 450 MWh plant is composed out of 210 battery units [1], so a little over 2 MWh just went up in smoke. Sources say that commercial chemistries emit between 20 and 200mg of hydrogen fluoride gas per watt hour. [2] At 100mg/Wh, the pack would have released a fifth of a metric ton of hydrogen fluoride gas onto the neighboring roadway over the course of the fire. You be the judge whether or not that warrants precautions. Edit: a second pack is on fire, so we're approaching half a metric ton of HF gas now [1] https://victorianbigbattery.com.au/ [2] https://www.nature.com/articles/s41598-017-09784-z
Not really true, you have a problem of toxic gases being released.[1] For my latest safety training in the maritime industry the handling of lithium battery fires was essentially put yourself upwind and let it burn it self out to prevent any exposure. The conclusion from the paper is important: "Using water mist resulted in a temporarily increased production rate of HF but the application of water mist had no significant effect on the total amount of released HF." Though presumably, submerging the car would help by solving the fumes in the water creating hydroflouric acid instead. [1]: https://www.nature.com/articles/s41598-017-09784-z
The larger problem is the toxic gases being released.[1] For my latest safety training in the maritime industry the handling of lithium battery fires was essentially put yourself upwind and let it burn it self out to prevent any exposure. [1]: https://www.nature.com/articles/s41598-017-09784-z
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