Research on Fire Safety Status of Electrochemical Energy Storage Power Station

In recent years, driven by multiple factors such as the goal of "carbon peak and carbon neutrality", the high-quality development policy of renewable energy, and the strong global market demand, the new energy storage has ushered in the current large-scale and high-quality leap through rapid development. However, fire accidents of electrochemical energy storage power stations occur frequently, and the problem of safe operation has aroused widespread concern.

Through the investigation of 18 electrochemical energy storage power stations in Inner Mongolia, Jiangxi, Hebei, Guizhou and Shandong, it is found that in terms of construction investment, the investment in fire protection system of energy storage power station is obviously insufficient. Research shows that 38.9 per cent of power station fire protection system investment accounted for less than 2 per cent, 33.3 per cent controlled at 2 per cent to 3 per cent, 22.2 per cent at 3 per cent to 5 per cent, and only 5.6 per cent more than 5 per cent. On the whole, while the current energy storage power station is facing high fire risk, the overall fire protection investment ratio is low, which is difficult to effectively support the systematic fire safety demand, and it is urgent to improve the policy guidance, standard construction and financial guarantee.

In terms of fire alarm system configuration level, most energy storage power stations have chosen energy storage compartment-level configuration, accounting for 88.89 percent, 55.56 percent of power stations have chosen cluster-level configuration, and the proportion of PACK-level configuration is only 22.22 percent. On the whole, the current energy storage power station fire protection system is still dominated by the cabin-level configuration, but due to the closed structure of the battery pack, the drug penetration rate is low, the re-ignition rate is high, indicating that the energy storage power station key links of the early warning and fire extinguishing capacity needs to be improved and improved.

In terms of fire extinguishing agent selection, the survey results show that 77.78 percent of energy storage power stations use heptafluoropropane as the main fire extinguishing agent, 22.22 percent use perfluorohexanone, and the proportion of aqueous film forming and other types of fire extinguishing agents is 5.56 percent. Although perfluorohexanone and heptafluoropropane fire extinguishing agents are environmentally friendly, their cooling capacity is relatively limited, it is difficult to completely inhibit the continuous thermal runaway reaction inside the battery, and there is high risk of fire.

Generally speaking, the current fire protection system of energy storage power station has formed a basic framework in terms of design leading, facility configuration and safety measures, but there are still obvious deficiencies in the construction of standards and specifications, system level optimization, fire extinguishing agent adaptability and so on. It is necessary to promote the system improvement and technological progress to comprehensively improve the systematicness and reliability of fire prevention and control of electrochemical energy storage power station.

As an energy storage and fire fighting enterprise, Shengsida focuses on the accuracy of the system level. In view of the current problem of insufficient PACK level early warning configuration, Shengsida has increased its investment in research and development of core-level and module-level monitoring technologies, and built a full-level early warning system of "battery-module-PACK-cabin" to realize early identification and early warning of thermal runaway risks. At the same time, based on the thermal runaway characteristics of different battery types (such as lithium iron phosphate, ternary lithium battery), the fire extinguishing agent is adapted to take into account environmental protection and economy, and reduce the risk of re-ignition.

In addition, Shengsida is committed to the construction of the whole life cycle service system, from the customized design of the fire protection scheme in the early stage, to the installation and commissioning of the equipment in the middle stage, and then to the system upgrade in the later stage, providing the whole process service to ensure the safe and stable operation of the energy storage power station.