Lithium Ion Battery Home Fire

[peakbagger]

I tend to support the ban if it exists. Of cource even Tesla is switching over to Lipo in place of the more problematic Lmnc chemistries on their Megapacks and reportedly some of their cars. Li po's have a far better rep from unexpected runaway fires.

[soby]

It is currently not legal in California to install a powerwall inside a house whether in the basement (the worst place possible) or on the wall of the garage. They must be outside the building envelope. This does demonstrate why the NEC is needed to keep people safe.

I can see that being a reasonable trade off in CA but not in New England. I don’t want my battery subjected to single digit temperatures in the winter.

[Calsun]

It comes down to considering all the factors and not going with the cheapest piece of equipment. My RV had more expensive lithium-phosphate batteries that included circuitry to allow them to charge in colder weather but they cost 25% more. It also depends on the situation and for winter use I would not go with lithium-phophate batteries unless the setup included a means to maintain an adequate temperature for charging.

With my house I avoided the fire and the low temperature problems by going to a standby generator. This month we had a 4 day outage and I would have needed to spend $15,000 for enough battery power for my house for that length of time.

Electrical codes are needed to keep people from doing something dangerous to themselves and to others out of ignorance or a desire to save a few dollars. That is why grounded outlets and arc fault circuit breakers and GFCI outlets are mandated in many situations. The cost is trivial compared to the cost to rebuild ones home or the cost of a funeral for someone who dies unnecessarily.