Quantitative identification of emissions from abused prismatic Ni-rich lithium-ion batteries

Abstract The emissions from lithium-ion batteries in the process of thermal runaway are one of the important sources of electric vehicle fire hazards. The purpose of this study is to reveal the gaseous and solid emission characteristics of lithium-ion batteries after thermal runaway. A 50 Ah commercial prismatic cell with Li(Ni0.6Mn0.2Co0.2)O2 cathode was triggered to thermal runaway by external heating in a sealed chamber with nitrogen atmosphere. Elements of settleable particles were detected, and size distributions were analyzed. The gaseous emissions were detected and their compositions were classified by boiling temperatures. The results show that the total emissions accounted for 28.53% of the cell mass. The settleable particles accounted for 17.00% of the emission mass, and 30 elements were found in them. Near 90% of the particle mass were those with a size less than 0.5 mm in diameter, and the median size of these particles was approximately 397 μm. A total of 31 compositions were found in the gaseous emissions, of which 17 were compositions with boiling temperatures below 25 °C, 8 compositions between 25 °C and 90 °C, and 6 compositions between 90 °C and 185 °C. The gases with boiling temperatures below 90 °C accounted for 32.75% of the emission mass, while the remaining gases and undetected particles accounted for 50.25%. These results further clarified the sources of lithium-ion battery fire hazards.