LFP batteries are dangerous, say research scientists

Introductory Paragraphs from the Paper

There are basically two types of lithium-ion batteries used in large-scale BESS installations, LFP (lithium iron phosphate) and NMC (nickel/manganese/cobalt). Both types have been used for a good many years around the world. Numerous BESS installations using LFP batteries have had cataclysmic disasters, when the LFP batteries spontaneously went into thermal runaway and exploded, resulting in a fire that could not be extinguished. Probably the best known LFP BESS fire is the one that occurred in Beijing in 2021.

Likewise, there have been numerous BESS installations using NMC batteries that have also had cataclysmic disasters, when the NMC batteries likewise went into thermal runaway and exploded, resulting in a fire that, likewise, could not be extinguished. The best-known illustration being the Moss Landing CA explosion and fire last month at the world´s largest BESS installation. (Incidentally, BESS stands for Battery Energy Storage Systems, which consist of large metal containers, often resembling shipping containers, each of which house hundreds of either NMC or LFP lithium-ion batteries.) 

The five research articles, below, all of them written by research scientists and all of them published in peer-reviewed science journals, discuss in detail why both LFP and NMC lithium-ion batteries are highly dangerous. As I said, both go into thermal runaway (for reasons explained below) and both continue to spontaneously reignite after apparently being quenched (because of stranded electricity in the batteries combined with the chemical cocktail used in the electrolyte, as explained below). Both types of battery produce extremely toxic HF (hydrogen fluoride) gas which, in moist air or when doused with water, turns into hydrochloric acid — the most insidious acid known to science. As it happens, thermal runaway LFP batteries produce far more toxic HF gas than do NMC batteries (when the electrical ‟capacity” for each is equalized). In addition, LFP batteries burn for a longer period of time than NMC batteries.