Exploding batteries have been in the news lately. Here are five examples of what can happen to high-energy cells if things go bad.
When a hoverboard battery goes up in flames
This poor guy had barely got his hoverboard out of the box when the batteries caught fire. Now he’s not exactly happy with the situation. Ironically, he didn’t set out to record a “fail” video. The camera just happened to be rolling when all this transpired.
The perils of lithium-polymer
Authorities concluded that a major fire in the Swiss municipality of Steckborn was probably started by a lithium-polymer battery in a model car. That prompted the Swiss Federal Laboratories for Materials Science and Technology to do some battery testing. They recorded what happens to mistreated lithium-polymer batteries in a YouTube video.
Laptop and cell phone batteries catch fire
Apparently the folks at the Swiss Federal Laboratories for Materials Science and Technology like to blow up batteries. In this video they show how batteries in laptops and cell phones can catch fire and explode. You will probably get more out of this video if you understand high German, but the visuals are interesting regardless of what language you speak.
Electric three-wheeler battery gets pretty well smoked
Another episode from the annals of the Swiss Federal Laboratories for Materials Science and Technology. This time researchers there mistreated a battery in an electric three wheeler. The resulting event required the services of a fire extinguisher.
Gasoline + Battery = What you’d expect
This dude might be running his own little myth-busting episode, disproving the idea that, what, high-energy batteries burned in gasoline won’t explode? They certainly do, as he shows quite graphically.
One thing to consider: As we head more and more toward high-power battery applications the batteries by necessity must contain more energy. We have learned to handle a highly flammable and dangerous liquid to power our daily transportation – gasoline (except for those unthinking people we can watch on YouTube blowing themselves up). So we will have to learn how to safely use and handle batteries in the same way. And like the automobile, our manufacturers will have to learn and build safeguards into the devices that use these high power batteries.
Agree; similarly, we had to learn how to use alternate current electricity we also cannot live without today.
The article is missing that fine line of hinting its own intent.