ᐅ Fire Risk of Photovoltaic Batteries: What Are the Installation Options?

bwollowb schrieb:

There are frequent concerns about the potential fire hazard posed by batteries in photovoltaic systems and how difficult they are to extinguish.

...and you hardly ever hear about one actually catching fire (without an external cause).

Mine is located in the basement equipment room between the control cabinet, heat pump, and network cabinet. It stays in good condition there, with a constant temperature of 18°C (64°F) year-round.

Fuchur schrieb:

...and you almost never hear about one actually catching fire (without an external cause).

Mine is located in the basement in the utility room, between the control panel, heat pump, and network cabinet. It stays there safely at a constant 18°C (64°F) year-round.

I agree with you! However, my concern is to minimize any residual risk in advance in the case of new construction. Apart from a smoke detector in the room, I have seen other ideas. For example, storing the battery at ground level in a separate equipment shed a little away from the house, on wheels, so it can be pulled out and allowed to burn in a controlled way if needed. What do you think about this?

That sounds expensive and labor-intensive.
I haven’t heard of any LiFePO4 home battery fires yet.
Have you?

Do you store your clothes dryer, toaster, kettle, phone (charger), laptop, and similar devices outside?
I have often heard or read about fires involving these appliances.

bwollowb schrieb:

I’ve seen other ideas, like storing the battery at ground level on rollers in a garden shed set some distance away from the house, so it can be pulled out when needed and allowed to burn in a controlled way. What do you think about that?

Battery housed separately in its own cabinet or, as usual, integrated as a home energy system?

As nice as the idea sounds, I find it quite impractical in reality:
1. You would either have to move the entire electrical distribution to the ground floor or spend a lot on additional wiring.
2. Even as a separate cabinet, but especially as a home energy system, it is connected with many cables that no one can disconnect without breathing protection in case of fire.
3. Even if points 1 and 2 are resolved, meaning the battery is in a separate cabinet on rollers and is disconnected from cables and placed right next to a ground-level patio door—who would actually take it outside?

Ask your building insurance about this topic. If they dismiss it and don’t charge extra, you can assume that the actual risks are extremely low. Otherwise, the clever statisticians would already apply an additional fee.

RotorMotor schrieb:

That sounds expensive and like a lot of effort.
I haven’t heard of any fires involving LiFePo4 home storage batteries.
Have you?

Do you store your dryer, toaster, kettle, phone (charger), laptop, and similar devices outside?
I have often heard or read about fires with these appliances.

Admittedly, you rarely hear about fires involving photovoltaic battery storage, and when something does happen, it makes a headlines that sell well. Until recently, I didn’t even know about LiFePo4 – I’m just a layperson.

However, the comparison to phones, laptops, and the like is not quite accurate. First, we’re not talking about batteries of the same scale here, and second, these devices are far more common than photovoltaic batteries.