DEFEATING THERMAL RUNAWAY

Abstract

Supposedly “safe” ,“discharged” lithium-ion batteries have exploded while being transported to recycling plants. Because of the Carbon- Lithium in the battery, they must be shipped as Class 9 Hazardous Materials, which is costly and inefficient. Here, we demonstrate elimination of thermal runaway for end-of-life lithium-ion batteries using supercritical CO2 to remove flammability hazards. Deactivation of worst-case scenario (charged) batteries from electric buses is successfully demonstrated.