BARRHEAD - It is only a matter of time before the Barrhead Regional Fire Services (BRFS) has to respond to an electric vehicle fire (EV).
BRFS firefighter Hielke Vandermeulen said that at the June 25 Town of Barrhead council meeting, in response to a question from Coun. Rod Klumph noted that several electric vehicles or hybrids in the town travelled through its jurisdiction.
Vandermeulen and his fellow BRFS firefighters Gina Kneller and Tyler Kalmbach recently returned from Indianapolis, where they attended the Fire Department Instructors Conference (FDIC).
One of the courses or sessions Vandermeulen attended was battling an electric vehicle fire.
"It's only a matter of time until Barrhead sees its first EV fire," he said, adding there is no one way to attack an EV fire.
Vandermeulen said issues causing the majority of electric vehicle fires are thermal runaways, which happen when the current flowing through the cell or battery causes its temperature to rise.
"It can be caused by damage to the battery itself, overcharging, or when the protective layer or the battery starts to break down," he said, adding it is the protective layer or electrolyte that starts to break down.
Vandermeulen added that when this process starts, it creates gasses, including Oxygen, from the breakdown of the lithium oxide.
Which is bad, he said, as fire requires Oxygen to maintain the self-contained chemical reaction.
"You can't smother or flood it with enough water to successfully extinguish it," he said. "So, basically, you must let the energy charge battery drain or let the vehicle burn itself out."
However, he said some fire departments are experimenting with ways to extinguish EV fires.
"In Pheonix, they are taking sea cans, filling them with sand after a vehicle is in it and then driving the whole thing out to the desert to burn itself out within a few weeks because of that self-contained fire reactions," Vandermeulen said. "As for how we would best extinguish such a fire, we would have to do more research."
Klumph asked what would happen if a vehicle fire occurred and if it was in an attached garage.
"Would you ram the door down and just pull it out of there," he asked.
Vandermeulen said the fire department would have no choice but to treat it like a standard vehicle fire .... "And if we could, draw the vehicle away from the house [using the winch from the BRFS Rescue One truck]."
Barry Kerton, TownandCountryToday.com
