4mo ago

Lithium-ion battery waste fires are increasing, and vapes are a big part of it

2024 was "a year of growth," according to fire-suppression company Fire Rover, but that's not an entirely good thing.

The company, which offers fire detection and suppression systems based on thermal and optical imaging, smoke analytics, and human verification, releases annual reports on waste and recycling facility fires in the US and Canada to select industry and media. In 2024, Fire Rover, based on its fire identifications, saw 2,910 incidents, a 60 percent increase from the 1,809 in 2023, and more than double the 1,409 fires confirmed in 2022.

Publicly reported fire incidents at waste and recycling facilities also hit 398, a new high since Fire Rover began compiling its report eight years ago, when that number was closer to 275.

33 comments

It's insane that disposables with lithium ion batteries are legal.
- ...that ought to be completely illegal
- They literally only exist because of all the government regulations that decimated the industry "because of the children."
  
  Not exactly. Toy-shaped non-nicotine fruit-flavored cheap disposables, are the best thing to get children hooked up on vaping.
  Tobacco companies used to promote candy cigarettes for the same purpose.
- I'm pretty sure they technically are but no one cares enough to stop their sale. Obama banned "vape flavorings targeting children" which all of them seem to be. I've only seen them for sale in vape/tobacco shops. Places that get regulated, like gas stations, aren't carrying them. At least around where I am in the USA.
  Edit. Doing further research... I guess they didn't?
Stop selling disposable vapes, this is not complicated. I've since stopped but first encountered vapes back when they called it e-smoking and the devices where really crude. After a few years they finally got something decently reliable and reusable down and people had their personal device.
I'm not even sure when disposables became a thing but the notion of use one and discard electronics is nuts. The whole industry could do well to come up with some standards so you don't have to search out some specific model of atomizer to fit a certain piece, but it's not impossible.
- The UK is about to ban disposable vapes, but I fear it may achieve little.
  What the legislation does is to define what "reusable" means, and demand that vapes must meet that.
  In reality, I suspect that manufacturers will simply adjust their strategies to produce vapes that are "technically" reusable and rechargeable and meet the law in a bare-minimum way, but really are intended to be used exactly once, just like disposable ones were, and that's exactly how they will continue to be treated by consumers.
  Cost will probably go up 20% to cover it, but that's all, and in the end even more material will be going in landfill.
  In my opinion, what the legislation should have done is to set an absolute minimum price on the cost of a vape pen. That would be very heavy-handed, but it would actually create the strong financial motivation required to force consumers to genuinely treat the vape pen as something they will re-use.
  
  This is what happened with plastic bags in some stores in the US. We passed plastic bag bans and while in a lot of cases the result was a combination of low-quality paper bags and legitimately reusable plastic totes, in the past couple of years some places have started giving out plastic bags that are way thicker than the ones we used to have and just calling them reusable. Like, yeah, they're strong enough to be reused, but that definitely doesn't seem to be the norm. We just ended up with single-use plastic bags that literally use more plastic.
I switched from cigarettes to vaping in 2016 -- after trying and failing multiple times through an eGo stage -- once box mods had evolved to the point of being reliable and delivering a satisfying hit. That mod worked until 2023.
I've since had three fail, and you don't want to spend $100 (when it's not Black Friday and your mod dies, that's the going rate at local vape shops, since I guess the margin on a single-18650 mod isn't good enough) to be able to use your remaining $12 of juice when a disposable that lasts for a few weeks runs $20.
As such, I've been using disposables for several months now. I don't like this transition given the waste and danger involved, but nicotine addiction is a bitch.
- I've been vaping since around 2012 and ran through a ton of disappointing eGo clones and mods and got a GeekVape Zeus about a year or two ago and it's been rock solid. It is a dual battery but that just means it lasts a day or more depending on how often you're using it.
- Have you considered checking out the used market? I haven't seriously vaped since 2016 when I used it to quit smoking (and all my vape stuff got stolen in a move in 2017), but I remember that the used mod scene was pretty damn good back in the day.
  I have a OBS Cube-X that's still going strong and does everything I want it to, so a used single-18650 like that might fit the bill depending on your needs and is probably way less than $100.
  
  I'm in the unfortunate situation of mail being several days delayed and certainly not wanting strangers learning where I park. The secondary market is not something I currently have access to.
I'm so happy vapes are illegal in Norway
- They're not. Check those laws again, only nicotine ones are banned.
  
  I mean... Those are the source of the problem in other countries. Take the addictive active compound away and people will stop using it
Disposable vapes didn't really exist in Australia until the govt banned vaping. Same for illegal tobacco and tobacco gang wars not being a thing until tobacco taxes were jacked up more than the tobacco costs
Why not use capacitors instead of lithium? Sure they won't hold a charge nearly as long, but they also charge in a fraction of the time too.

33 comments