Measurement data from full-scale fire experiments of battery electric vehicles and internal combustion engine vehicles.

Abstract

Over time, the burning behaviour of passenger vehicles has been influenced by continuous advancements in vehicle design, including changes in materials, manufacturing processes, and the integration of modern lithium-ion battery powertrains. Fire protection engineers, first responders, and other safety professionals currently lack sufficient data to determine whether existing fire protection system designs and firefighting practices effectively mitigate the burning behaviour of modern vehicle fires or to adapt these approaches to any measurable changes in fire dynamics. Eighteen full-scale vehicle fire experiments were conducted in a laboratory environment to obtain a novel data set describing the fire size, thermal hazards, and evolved smoke and particulate species resulting from vehicle fires. Vehicle mass, gas temperature, heat flux, sorbent tube, Fourier-transform infrared spectrometer, and suppression waterflow data are provided in tabular format. Eight vehicle models across six manufacturers were selected based on the most popular battery electric and gasoline powered compact and mid-sized recently sold in North America at the time of writing. Experiments consisted of nine free-burn experiments wherein the gasoline vehicles were ignited in the engine compartment and the electric vehicle battery packs were induced into thermal runaway; these fires progressed unabated until the occurrence of natural flame extinction. Another four experiments simulated electric vehicle fire suppression using ordinary water and traditional vehicle fire suppression techniques. In one additional experiment, an encapsulator firefighting agent was added to the water. The final four experiments consisted of deploying fire blankets over the burning vehicles a single strategy or in combination with water simultaneously applied from beneath. There are many potential uses of this data, but primary uses are expected to include revision of design criteria and guidance within the fire protection engineering community, strategic and tactical decision aids for vehicle fire incident operations, validation of existing (and development of new) fire behavior models, and guidance to vehicle manufacturers for improved fire safety design.