So if someone has an EV fire in a connected garage which insurance company pays? Car insurance or home owners insurance? When I built my home building code (UBC for USA) stipulated two layers of 5/8 inch "fire guard" sheet rock for all garage surfaces shared between garage and the dwelling itself...supposedly gives 1 hour of burn thru time. It would appear that would not be sufficient if it were an EV fire...
I live in Washington State, one cannot legally bring a filled propane tank onto a ferry...a burning EV on a ferry would be catastrophic. Whose insurance, car owner or car manufacturer pays?
Once again the theory of unintended consequences will come into play... changes in insurance, changes in building codes, changes in zoning codes (building near National Forest... unincorporated rural).
Thoughts?
Wiley
which insurance company pays?
It's not appropriate for me to advise you on such matters.
If you want the most accurate information, go to the source. Ask your insurance provider.
It's probably going to vary from policy to policy, and I haven't read your particular contract. I don't know your state laws, etc.
Car insurance or home owners insurance?
From my understanding: Car insurance - it's 3rd party damage caused by a car.
So if someone has an EV fire in a connected garage which insurance company pays?
The same as a Hybrid - the by far most likely category to catch fire.
Thoughts?
"hybrids were the most likely to catch fire, with 3,474.5 instances per 100,000 vehicle sales, followed by ice (1,529.9/100k) and then EV (25.1/100k)" (source)
The data is that they're less likely to catch fire (per 100k cars, adjusted for their smaller marketshare),
but EV fires have traditionally been quite a bit harder to put out - although putting out gallons of highly flammable gasoline also ain't particularly easy.
The data is that they're less likely to catch fire
But which vehicles are more likely to start a fire unattended, AFTER THEY ARE PARKED for they day, or while the owners are sleeping?
A hybrid - all the same components as an EV but has 138x the rate of fires.
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About 15%~20% of ICE car fires happen when they’re parked.
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EVEN if we assume ALL EV fires happen while you’re not driving - the likely hood Is still nothing compared to an ICE or a Hybrid.
Source: FEMA report on car fires.
OK and there's one other factor that sticks out in my mind (which I doubt there's data about). How many of those fires are preventable. Many fires are caused by negligence/lack of maintenance. Things that don't happen to responsible owners. Then there's fires caused inherent problems in the design, or manufacturer defects. It's an important distinction, because you will always have the former.
Good point. How do fires from 15-20 year old or older gasoline cars compare in number to fires from electric cars in the same age range?
@ChuckTobias
The older an EV battery is, the safer it is.
EVs don't have to deal with pumping fuel around hot metal objects - so age probably won't affect the risk of fire nearly as much.
https://www.tugraz.at/en/tu-graz/university/climate-neutral-tu-graz/singleview/article/e-batterien-je-aelter-desto-sicherer0
@mmj This would not explain why Hybrid cars are 227% more likely to catch fire than an ICE car.
Are Hybrids much more neglected than petrol cars? or is it because Hybrids combine high voltage with gasoline...
@Dan - As far as the age of EV battery, if they still have enough juice to run the car that's a lot of energy to go through deteriorated wiring, and when lithium-ion batteries do burn, watch out! By the time they present no danger it's probably going to be time to replace them and hopefully examine that high-voltage wiring for deterioration as well. As far as I know there are not a whole lot of 20-year-old EVs around for collecting real-world data.
As far as hybrids, it would not surprise me if high voltage plus gasoline is a recipe for disaster, and there are enough old hybrids around where that could very well be a problem as wiring and fuel lines are neglected and deteriorate.
@imperator, Since there are so many more old, poorly-maintained gasoline vehicles on the road than old EVs those statistics may be somewhat skewed. It might be instructive to compare the fire stats for cars no more than something like 10 years old. (Possibly excluding Hyundai/Kia products which are in a risk category all their own.)
well hybrids combine all the negatives of both worlds
this number represents factors that cannot be helped (by you, the owner), and I have a suspicion that this number is much higher for EV's simply due to the reactive nature of Lithium batteries, and how easily they tend to go off in minor accidents. (especially when certain manufacturers design the battery to be a load bearing structural component)
Modern EV batteries do not “go off” easily in a crash - due to new tech.
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Here’s a comparison between old battery tech (like in a Toyota Hybrid) and new one (like in most EVs)
https://youtu.be/CGQwqWqzkNA
Old tech can have a thermal runaway.
Modern EV batteries - do not.
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On ICE cars 60% of car fire fatalities are result of ICE cars combusting after a crash.
With all the Teslas on the road, only 56 EV fires a year…
(a big chunk of the fires are the defective Bolt and Kona with LG chem units)
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Btw, this is kinda fun to see: here they showcased how even in after 2 brutal crashes (in the area where the battery is most susceptible to damage) - and even with battery case deformation it remained safe and drivable.
https://youtu.be/n2J0BVxt-rg?t=13
(11A) - Tesla catches fire after colliding with road debris, which punctured the battery
(11B) - The battery fire was reported to be extremely severe and produced a lot of toxic gases... The vehicle was then placed in quarantine for 48 hours to monitor it for reignition
If you wanna get in fires resulting from crahses:
- Hybrids and ICEs - 173 fires per 100k cars.
- EVs - 25 per 100k cars TOTAL.
If we wanna be somewhat precise, looking at your graph if's less than 1/4 of the total,
assuming 1/5, about 5 per 100k EVs catch fire in a crash - 34 times less than Hybrid and ICE cars.
Hyundai and Kia tell owners of nearly 500,000 vehicles to park outside due to fire risk
https://www.cnn.com/2022/02/08/business/hyundai-kia-fire-recall/index.html
As we've known for a long time now, Hyundai/Kia "kwality" brings with it a whole litany of problems
Oh, yeah, when you park them outside, then they are easier to steal.
https://www.classaction.org/kia-hyundai-theft-problem-lawsuits
A good insurance settlement may be the best outcome for the owners of those stupid things.
As you remember,
we discussed how old tech burns when the rest don't.
RIMAC used NCM, like a Toyota RAV4 Hybrid and of course that catches fire.
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Incredibly, even with that tech I found no year in which an EV was even close to the fire risk of an ICE let alone a hybrid.
Yeah, cars made in the US are disappointing.
The rest of the industry already made the entire car waterproof.
https://youtu.be/kqFTEUEAdOY
Some even with dedicated "watercraft" modes that allow them to function as a boat.