Across the Atlantic Ocean in the United Kingdom, a movement is growing to stamp out faulty lithium-ion batteries. Authoritative health and safety platform SHP, reports that over 80 organizations have signed up for the Battery Breakdown campaign. This project aims to address the root causes of the growing number of fatal e-scooter and e-bike fires plaguing the nation.
Unintended Consequences of Faulty Lithium-Ion Batteries
The Battery Breakdown movement is pressing for ‘improvements to legislation that will ensure safer, cleaner, healthier environments for all’. The latest signatory, Chartered Institute of Environmental Health (CIEH) is calling for third-party regulation to close nagging gaps.
CIEH includes injuries, fatalities, and air pollution among the unintended consequences of faulty lithium-ion batteries. Another signatory, Electrical Safety First has drafted a Bill to address these issues as follows:
- Reclassify e-scooter and e-bike batteries as high risk, requiring third party certification.
- Regulate the safe disposal of spent lithium batteries to minimize fires and air pollution.
- Standardize requirements for conversion kits and chargers, to promote safe use.
‘This is a deadly issue,’ the CEO of Electrical Safety First insists. ‘We need to tackle it through improved safety measures,’ and bring it under control.
Safe Use Includes Battery Recycling
The European Union predicts that its member nations will throw away 78 million batteries, in internet-of-thing devices in 2025. It follows that urgent action is needed if we are to prevent this looming disaster. This because some of these devices will inevitably contain faulty lithium-ion batteries.
It follows that there is an urgent need to bring potential thermal runaway events under control. Spent lithium-ion batteries still contain sufficient energy to overheat and explode, if they are punctured, impacted or crushed.
Better consumer education must form part of any campaign to mitigate the unintended consequences of lithium-ion batteries. This needs to begin at school level, so the emerging generation understands the risks attached to substandard batteries.
More Information
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