Like the title says, why are batteries at risk to catching fire on planes? Why do they ask you to remove batteries from your luggage?
In: 20
A battery powers things. It does this by converting chemical energy into electrical energy (potential).
Think about how your powerful phone can operate for hours at a time. It has a large screen, communicates with cell towers, wifi, etc. It’s a whole computer in your pocket that can last all day on a single charge.
That is actually a fair amount of energy.
Under normal operation, the battery slowly releases that energy. However, the energy is still stored in that battery in chemical format. Essentially, if a li-ion battery has burst, it reacts with oxygen and begins to rapidly release all of that energy. Releasing energy at that rate basically causes a fire.
Tl;dr: batteries store energy. If li-ions get punctured, energy release. Fire. Bad times.
A battery powers things. It does this by converting chemical energy into electrical energy (potential).
Think about how your powerful phone can operate for hours at a time. It has a large screen, communicates with cell towers, wifi, etc. It’s a whole computer in your pocket that can last all day on a single charge.
That is actually a fair amount of energy.
Under normal operation, the battery slowly releases that energy. However, the energy is still stored in that battery in chemical format. Essentially, if a li-ion battery has burst, it reacts with oxygen and begins to rapidly release all of that energy. Releasing energy at that rate basically causes a fire.
Tl;dr: batteries store energy. If li-ions get punctured, energy release. Fire. Bad times.
The Reactions YouTube channel (put out by the American Chemical Society) just posted a video on [Why are Electric Car Fires So Hard to Put Out](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=jQZK0z7xYuQ) that is relevant to your question. As others have mentioned: when they start, the reaction is highly exothermic (heat generating), usually creates its own oxygen, and thus can only be stopped by massive amounts of water bringing them below their “critical” temperature. Fires are an especially deadly risk on an airplanes, and as such batteries are a special concern.
The Reactions YouTube channel (put out by the American Chemical Society) just posted a video on [Why are Electric Car Fires So Hard to Put Out](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=jQZK0z7xYuQ) that is relevant to your question. As others have mentioned: when they start, the reaction is highly exothermic (heat generating), usually creates its own oxygen, and thus can only be stopped by massive amounts of water bringing them below their “critical” temperature. Fires are an especially deadly risk on an airplanes, and as such batteries are a special concern.
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