#thermal-runaway

Wide overhead photograph at dusk of a low-rise New York City brownstone vestibule with a beat-up delivery e-bike leaning against the iron handrail of the front stoop; a single bright orange ember glows on the taped-up battery casing while a delivery rider in a quilted jacket walks past on the sidewalk — calm, unstaged street-level framing showing exactly where lithium-ion battery fires actually start, in residential entryways and stairwells of low-rise New York City buildings rather than open garages

🔋 Battery Fire Safety May 23, 2026 · 15 min read

NYC's 2023 Battery Fires: 268 Incidents, 18 Deaths

In one year, New York logged 268 lithium-ion battery fires and 18 deaths from e-bikes and e-scooters — and rewrote micromobility safety law.

Wide overhead photograph of an open multi-storey car park at dusk with a single white electric crossover parked in a marked EV charging bay glowing under a soft blue LED sign that reads CHARGING — beside it sit two ordinary silver and red gasoline sedans; a gentle wisp of pale white vapour curls from the rear wheel arch of the EV while the petrol cars sit silent — the calm neutral framing emphasises that EV fires happen far less often than gas car fires yet remain operationally harder to fight

🔋 Battery Fire Safety May 15, 2026 · 9 min read

Are EV Fires Really More Common Than Gas Car Fires?

Across U.S., Swedish, Australian, Norwegian and Polish data, EV fires happen 20 to 80 times less often than gas car fires per registered vehicle.

Side-by-side fire-safety laboratory thermal-runaway test on a clean white background — left: a single cylindrical green LFP 18650 cell on a stainless-steel rig venting a slow controlled plume of pale grey smoke from its scored positive vent with only a small dim flame, instrumented with thin K-type thermocouple wires; right: an identical purple-cased high-nickel NMC 18650 cell undergoing violent thermal runaway, ejecting a powerful directional jet of bright yellow-orange flame and white-hot sparks straight upward inside a turbulent black-edged smoke plume, casing visibly bulging

🔋 Battery Fire Safety May 2, 2026 · 11 min read

LFP vs NMC Battery Safety: Why Chemistry Decides Fire Risk

LFP vs NMC battery chemistry sets the fire risk before any vent opens. Here is why one chemistry burns hotter, vents more gas, and explodes more often.

Side-by-side fire-safety laboratory test showing a swollen LiPo battery pouch cell on the left with bulging aluminium-plastic laminate and exposed jellyroll layers, next to a vented 18650 cylindrical lithium-ion cell on the right emitting a bright directional jet flame from its scored positive-terminal vent

🔋 Battery Fire Safety April 20, 2026 · 7 min read

Why a LiPo Battery Is Really a Lithium-Ion Battery

A LiPo battery is a lithium-ion battery. The polymer only names the gel and pouch. Here is why that matters for fire safety.

Cutaway of a cylindrical lithium-ion battery showing cathode, anode, separator, and electrolyte with ions flowing between electrodes

🔋 Battery Fire Safety April 17, 2026 · 9 min read

Lithium-Ion Battery Basics: How They Work and Why They Burn

What a lithium-ion battery is, how the 'rocking chair' of ions works, and why this Nobel-winning chemistry also carries real fire risk.

A glowing log at the pyrolysis front, volatile gases rising from a carbonized surface — the moment wood turns into fire

🔥 Fire Fundamentals April 14, 2026 · 17 min read

The Science of Pyrolysis: How Heat Unmakes Everything

Pyrolysis — heat breaking molecular bonds without oxygen — drives wildfires, battery thermal runaway, biochar, plastic recycling, and even coffee roasting.