The risk of a catastrophic fire from an electric vehicle battery landing in the tip is mounting as the first wave of EV batteries reaches its end of life, and the waste industry says Australia needs a plan as more electric cars hits the road.
The waste sector has urged an immediate intervention to stop small consumer batteries ending up in landfill, which is
causing thousands of fires each year inside recycling facilities, waste trucks and landfill.
And one of the few EV battery recyclers in the country says the "inherently dangerous" EV and home batteries must be part of a nationwide ban of batteries to landfill.
While the sector warns large batteries from EVs or home solar storage have already found their way to landfill, a projected increase of EV and home battery sales from 100,000 tonnes next year to 800,000 tonnes in a decade's time could bring a surge in the risk of "catastrophic" fire.
"With that ... growth, you're going to have isolated incidents become more at scale,"
Fires caused by batteries are already difficult to extinguish, but Mr Linge said with EV and home batteries — which are effectively thousands of lithium-ion cells linked together — firefighters generally cannot extinguish them but only try to contain them until they burn out.
Industry figures say a
fire at Sydney Airport last year that set five cars alight was a wake-up call to the risk of EV batteries for the waste sector.
