When a lithium-ion battery catches fire, it can be very hard to extinguish and can burn very fiercely³. If a battery is going to catch fire, the likely cause is thermal runaway¹. This is when a battery experiences an increase in temperature that eventually leads to cell short-circuiting or disintegration that can spark a fire¹. There are three main abuse factors that can send a battery into thermal runaway — mechanical, thermal or electrical¹. The contents of the battery are under pressure, so if a metal fragment punctures a partition that keeps the components separate or the battery is punctured, the lithium reacts with water in the air vigorously, generating high heat and sometimes producing a fire².

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