In China, 640 EVs caught fire in the first quarter of 2022, up 32 percent

Although electric vehicles (EV) are heralded as the future of mobility, however, it seems that EV manufacturers has yet to get a handle on the issue of battery catching fire. It is barely summer in China, the biggest EV market in the world, and yet there are already plenty of reports of EVs catching fire.

In March, a XPeng G3 caught fire and burnt down to its skeleton in Shenzhen, while another EV, an Aiways U5, caught fire in a charging station in Chengdu.

The two incidents are only two of 640 EVs that caught fire in the first quarter of this year. According to the Chinese Fire and Rescue Department of the Ministry Emergency Management’s data released on 3-April-2022, that means that there are seven EVs catching fire per day.

The number is also a 32 percent year-on-year increase.

If you think that the fire incidents are limited to only cars from Chinese brands, a number of Teslas had also fell victim to battery fires. The models that reportedly caught fire are the Model 3 and Model S.

Out of 86 reported fire accidents, Chinese brand BYD has the most reported fires. But it is hardly surprising as BYD is the largest EV manufacturer in China. Think Perodua Myvi and its notoriety because of the large volume that Perodua sells, it is the same for BYD.

The latest BYD vehicle that caught fire occurred in October 2021, it was a BYD Han that was seen emitting white smoke on the side of the Shenzhen Shuiguan Expressway. The last Tesla fire also reportedly occurred in October 2021 where a Model S spontaneously caught fire while it was parked.

According to the data released by the fire and rescue department, there are four main types of fire accidents; catching fire while charging, catching fire while driving, catching fire while parked, or catching fire after a collision.

Out of 86 reported incidents only 7 incidents were due to unknown causes while 31 occurred while the car was parked, 22 occurred during charging, 20 occurred when the car was still on the move, and six occurred after a collision.

A further report by the Beijing Institute of Technology also revealed that 38.5 percent of the incidents occurred while in a static state and 27.5 percent of incidents occurred while the EV was charging.

About 66 percent of fire incidents happen in hot months while 34 percent occurred during cold months. Fire occurrences during the winter months is largely due to charging.

Low temperature DC fast charging can cause the battery to catch fire if the electronic control systems failed to preheat the battery. Another cause is lithium carbonate precipitation and the formation of lithium dendrites in ternary lithium batteries and lithium iron phosphate batteries.

As for catching fire after a collision, the China Passenger Car Association explains that the cells in the battery pack might get punctured in a collision causing other components to short circuit.

This will in turn will raise the internal temperature of the batteries causing the pack to overheat and catch fire.

Regardless, the increasing number of EV fires can also be looked at from a positive point of view. The increase in EV fires is proportionate to the increase in EV ownership in China.

In February 2022, EV sales data shows that BYD sold close to 89,000 EVs, that is a year-on-year increase of 749.04 percent. Note that the data only shows for one brand, if you were to take into account other EV brands in China, the number of EVs sold will be in the 200,000s.