Posted on 02/20/2022 9:37:54 PM PST by george76
True...but they are certainly very close.
"2. The chances if them being retrofittable to present vehicles is somewhere between none and zero,"
And you know this how?? It is certainly easy enough to do.
“That is SCARY...being on a ferry with an EV lighting up.”
Bring your own lifeboat.
If government hasn’t prevented the practice, I’d be surprised if insurance underwriters haven’t made, like the civil unrest exclusion, exceptions to EV fires.
Haven’t seen at FR anything about EV auto insurance either.
Whatever. No thanks.
As a retired long-time Hazmat team leader... I have no idea exactly how this will ultimately turn out; it seems likely that the ship will be a complete loss. But we are in uncharted territory. It is just one more "minor detail" that our leftist influenced leaders didn't seem to have anticipated. I am not sure why. Every new laptop, cell phone or other electronic trinket with even a lithium-ion battery that weighs a fraction of an ounce is required to have warning labels on the outside of the box warning that it contains a hazardous materials that are not allowed to be transported on a passenger aircraft or other vessel.
It is interesting the number of people in the thread who assume that there is metallic lithium in the batteries and assume that a class D extinguishing agent is the proper material to put out a burning bank of lithium-ion cells. Class D extinguishers are not effective or appropriate to use against an Electric Vehicle fire.
Then we have heard from those who have looked it up with a simple search on how to extinguish a lithium-ion battery fire and have been told that the only way to fight the fire is to drown or cool it with water. And there are firefighter training videos on the internet showing firefighters putting out mock electric vehicle fires with hose streams.
There are many problems with this. First, how do you get water to the part that is burning when the entire assembly is fully encapsulated in a structure designed to keep water from the cells? In my somewhat limited experience and even the somewhat limited experience of the fire department that I retired from these types of fires just eventually burn themselves out and the vast majority of the water that is directed at the fire is wasted and just makes the environmental damage worse.
Fortunately, most electric vehicles are still relatively new and like other "newish" vehicles they do not catch on fire as often as older vehicles. And also fortunately, the batteries are not filled with a highly volatile substance but once an electric car sized battery gets going for who knows what reason they do burn and are very difficult to completely extinguish. A major part of the hazard is the electrical charge contained within the assembly. In a damaged assembly it is unpredictable and almost impossible to measure the actual charge left.
In reality the entire assembly needs to be hauled to an area where it can be broken down into small chunks before it can be considered completely inert.
In the future it is most likely that electric cars will be shipped without their batteries installed. The batteries will be likely be shipped in containers that can be flooded to cool them or easily tossed overboard to protect the ship. The end result will be added expense to those who want an electric vehicle.
Good point. The insurance companies will confront the real risks. The highest concentration of EVs is in southern California where there is little moisture and the streets are not regularly salted. If EVs ever become popular ( by taste or coercion) in northern winter states, it will be interesting to see what happens especially as those batteries age.
Speaking of “solid state” rechargeable batteries... I assume that you have kept abreast of the “news” of their development better than I have. The problem is that most of the news available originates from press releases from companies and individuals hoping that investors will give them money. We end up with all sorts of claims about environmental friendliness, high efficiency, and other developments that are always just around the corner. And this excrement gets repeated and amplified by leftist morons who will say anything that fits their narrative. It is nearly impossible to evaluate how much of it is true. I would not hold my breath.
Assuming that’s would work, then what? No port is going to allow it entry. They could pump the fuel into other tankers, burn the residual fuel, and scuttle the thing. Is there enough scrap to make it worth the effort to bring it in? I’m curious what’s happening with the superstructure. At some point, it’s going to be seriously compromised.
Just a watched a video about that. Guy had his car charging outside and it still caught his garage on fire.
“And you know this how?? It is certainly easy enough to do.”
You don’t seem to understand that I am actually on your side but there are realistic limitations of the technology as it presently exists.
Car manufacturers NEVER make available significant improvements to previous model year cars or their parts unless the parts are actually deficient in function under warranty, for about a million legal, regulatory, and liability reasons. No money in it. MAYBE, someday, the aftermarket will step in but building these batteries and their support systems is a very high capital project.
During the Soviet investigation of Chernobyl, one of the chief technologists of Nuclear Power in the USSR said, “Science requires victims”. I’d interpret that as “progress requires victims”. I don’t want to be a financial or actual victim on the road to progress.
I follow the science and engineering publications on the subject...not “news”. I gave up on the “news” media as a source of reliable information back in 1975....
And of those I am very much aware.
You may follow them but you sure do not provide any links to any of them. The links that you provided in the last year that were not to “science and engineering publications” They were to LENR advocacy groups and your favorite book.
Your three favorites:
and your favorite book on the subject:
https://www.abebooks.com/9780967854809/Excess-Heat-Why-Cold-Fusion-0967854806/plp
Other than links back to Free Republic discussions I find that you have provided links to two companies web pages:
https://aureon.ca/ ... hoping for investors
https://graphenemg.com/energy-storage-solutions/aluminum-ion-battery/ ... hoping for investors
So where are the links to all the science and engineering publications that you spend your time perusing?
It is funny that the one subordinate that I had who gave me the most trouble was a chemical engineer. The guy believed in every crackpot load of nonsense that came along. When we argued he always claimed that he was a scientist and that I was not and that was the best that he could do. In reality he had never been more than a glorified lab assistant.
At emergency scenes he seemed incapable of following even the simplest and most direct commands. Then I would find him complaining to which ever chief who showed up. I could have had him fired six times or more for violating the chain of command and putting entire operations in jeopardy by not taking care of the tasks he had been assigned. But his father was a long-time good friend of mine and well respected on the department, so he got to skate by.
I wanted to apologize for a gross exaggeration in my last post to you. I said, “I could have had him fired six times or more for violating the chain of command and putting entire operations in jeopardy by not taking care of the tasks he had been assigned.”
I would have liked to have had him fired, but in reality, he was a union represented government employee and about the worst that I could have done was gotten him kicked off of our Hazmat team. And part of the reason that I did not is that he was the only trained chemist that I had as an underling, although this was hardly worth the headaches that he caused me.
I don't post those, because I doubt there are very many interested in that depth of science. What I do post is to subjects where I have some unique potential experience.
I do most of my reading for my own education.
If he was a chemical engineer, he was most assuredly NOT a chemist. Chemical engineers do not have a deep background in chemistry.
His dad had a degree in electrical engineer but worked as a chemist for an oil refinery before he came to our fire department. My understanding was that his son, my subordinate had a degree in chemical engineering and that he worked at a lab before he came to work for our fire department. He said that he mostly maintaining testing equipment. But he claimed expertise in any area that was being discussed at any time.
You do realize that people do not always work in areas that directly relate to their degree?
Of course. But some of us have been lucky enough to do so, and have throughout their careers (fifty years in my case).
But I will say this, and it will likely piss off some...NO ENGINEER is a scientist. They work in areas closely related to science, yes, but their focus is different.
Once again... we agree.
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