On one side of the battery, it is elemental Lithium.
It exchanges electrons across a membrane with another substantial.
Using water on it is bad because the reaction between Lithium and water evolves Hydrogen gas, which ignites in the fire.
Comment on Chemistry is weird
entwine413@lemm.ee 3 days ago
That’s one thing that annoys me about lithium batteries. Every time there’s an EV fire, people pop out of the woodwork to shit on the FD for using water to put it out.
Just because the name has lithium in it doesn’t mean it’s elemental lithium.
Geodad@lemmy.world 3 days ago
entwine413@lemm.ee 3 days ago
You’re wrong.
Lithium batteries contain little to no elemental lithium. They normally contain lithium cobalt oxide, lithium iron phosphate, or lithium nickel manganese cobalt oxide as the anode, and a lithium salt as the electrolyte.
Water is about the only way to put one out because it’s an exothermic reaction, and two out of the three are self-oxidizing.
The biggest danger of a lithium battery getting wet is that it shorts, which can lead to a fire because it goes into thermal runaway. But this can happen if you have one in your pocket with spare change.
shroomato@lemmy.world 3 days ago
A tiny “ackshually” is that there also exist non-rechargeable lithium batteries that have actual elemental lithium in them, which might be adding to the confusion.
entwine413@lemm.ee 2 days ago
Even those aren’t elemental lithium. They use Lithium-iron disulfide, Lithium-thionyl chloride, Lithium-manganese dioxide, and Lithium-sulfur dioxide.
CaptainBlagbird@lemmy.world 3 days ago
What does EV and FD stand for?
ghostlychonk@lemm.ee 3 days ago
Electric vehicle and fire department.
corvi@lemm.ee 3 days ago
It’s a situation of just enough knowledge, I think. It’s true that water won’t put out an EV battery fire, but it will cool it down and prevent the fire from spreading.
entwine413@lemm.ee 3 days ago
Well, it will put out the fire, but it does it by cooling the battery down so the reaction stops (like you said)
Karyoplasma@discuss.tchncs.de 3 days ago
I guess it depends on what burns. Water is conductive, so you might not want to use it to put out an electrical fire because of the risk of electrocution.
entwine413@lemm.ee 3 days ago
A lithium battery fire is a chemical fire, not an electrical one. There’s pretty much a zero percent chance of getting electrocuted putting one out with water.