- New York City wants lithium-ion e-bike batteries to be stopped at the border when they don’t meet national safety standards after rash of deadly fires Fortune
- FDNY commissioner testifies at CPSC hearing on lithium-ion batteries CBS New York
- As e-bikes proliferate, so do deadly fires blamed on exploding lithium-ion batteries The Associated Press
- Laura Kavanagh’s out-of-town call: On WTC Health Program and lithium-ion batteries, Washington has to deliver New York Daily News
- Fire deaths prompt federal review of e-bike rules Associated Press
- View Full Coverage on Google News
Tag Archives: batteries
Facebook drains users’ cellphone batteries intentionally says ex-employee
A long-standing rumor suggests that the Facebook and Facebook Messenger apps drain the battery on cellphones that have the apps installed. If you believe former Facebook employee George Hayward, a data scientist, Facebook can secretly drain the battery on its users’ cellphones on purpose. As reported by The New York Post, there is actually a name for what it is that Facebook is doing, It is called “negative testing” and it allows tech companies to secretly run down the batteries on someone’s phone in order to test features on an app or to see how an image might load.
Hayward was fired by Facebook parent Meta for refusing to participate in negative testing. “I said to the manager, ‘This can harm somebody,’ and she said by harming a few we can help the greater masses. Any data scientist worth his or her salt will know, Don’t hurt people,” he told the Post.
Hayward was axed by Meta in November and originally filed a lawsuit against the company in Manhattan Federal Court. The 33-year-old worked for Meta’s Facebook Messenger app which delivers text, phone calls, and video calls between users. In the suit, Hayward’s attorney, Dan Kaiser, pointed out that draining users’ smartphone batteries puts people at risk especially “in circumstances where they need to communicate with others, including but not limited to police or other rescue workers.”
Social media apps like Facebook Messenger can intentionally drain the batteries powering users’ smartphones
The suit had to be withdrawn because Meta’s terms of employment forced Hayward to argue his case in arbitration. Kaiser says that most people have no idea that Facebook and other social media companies can drain your battery intentionally. Commenting on the practice of negative testing, the lawyer added, “It’s clearly illegal. It’s enraging that my phone, that the battery can be manipulated by anyone.”
Originally hired in 2019, Hayward was receiving a six-figure annual paycheck from Meta. But when it came to the company’s request to perform the negative testing, Hayward said, “I refused to do this test. It turns out if you tell your boss, ‘No, that’s illegal,’ it doesn’t go over very well.”
At one point during his employment at Meta, the company handed Hayward an internal training document titled “How to run thoughtful negative tests.” The document included examples of how to run such tests. After reading the document, Hayward said that it appeared to him that Facebook had used negative testing before. He added, “I have never seen a more horrible document in my career.”
Joe Rogan podcast guest explains ‘heart-wrenching’ source of electric vehicle, iPhone batteries in viral video
A Harvard visiting professor and modern slavery activist exposed the “appalling” cobalt mining industry in the Congo on a recent episode of “The Joe Rogan Experience” that went viral. The video has already racked up over one million views and counting.
Siddharth Kara, author of “Cobalt Red: How The Blood of The Congo Powers Our Lives,” told podcast host Joe Rogan that there’s no such thing as “clean cobalt.’”
“That’s all marketing,” Kara said.
Kara told Rogan that the level of “suffering” of the Congolese people working in cobalt mines was astounding.
BIDEN TURNS TO COUNTRY WITH DOCUMENTED CHILD LABOR ISSUES FOR GREEN ENERGY MINERAL SUPPLIES: ‘IT’S EGREGIOUS’
Podcast giant Joe Rogan reacted to a guest’s stories of the cobalt mining industry in a recent episode.
(The Joe Rogan Experience/Spotify)
When asked by Rogan if there was any cobalt mine in the Congo that did not rely on “child labor” or “slavery,” the Harvard visiting professor told him there were none.
“I’ve never seen one and I’ve been to almost all the major industrial cobalt mines” in the country, Kara said.
One reason for that is that the demand for cobalt is exceptionally high: “Cobalt is in every single lithium, rechargeable battery manufactured in the world today,” he explained.
As a result, it’s difficult to think of a piece of technology that does not rely on cobalt to function, Kara said. “Every smartphone, every tablet, every laptop and crucially, every electric vehicle” needs the mineral.
The Democratic Republic of the Congo is one of the poorest nations in the world. (AP Photo/Clarice Butsapu)
GREEN ENERGY PROJECTS FACE STARK ENVIRONMENTAL, LOCAL OPPOSITION NATIONWIDE
“We can’t function on a day-to-day basis without cobalt, and three-fourths of the supply is coming out of the Congo,” he added. “And it’s being mined in appalling, heart-wrenching, dangerous conditions.”
But “by and large the world doesn’t know what’s happening” in the Congo, Kara said.
“I don’t think people are aware of how horrible it is,” Rogan agreed.
The Biden administration recently entered into an agreement with the Democratic Republic of the Congo and Zambia to bolster the green energy supply chain, despite the DRC’s documented issues with child labor.
ENVIRONMENTAL GROUPS KEEP PUSHING EXTREME MEASURES AMID GLOBAL ENERGY CRISIS
Cobalt initially “took off because it was used in lithium-ion batteries to maximize their charge and stability,” Kara explained. “And it just so happened that the Congo is sitting on more cobalt than the rest of the planet combined,” he added.
Men work in a gold mine in Chudja, northeastern Congo, one of the areas in which so-called “conflict minerals” are mined.
(AFP Photo / Lionel Healing)
As a result, the Congo, a country of roughly 90 million people, became the center of a geopolitical conflict over valuable minerals. “Before anyone knew what was happening, [the] Chinese government [and] Chinese mining companies took control of almost all the big mines and the local population has been displaced,” Kara said. Subsequently, the Congolese are “under duress.”
He continued: “They dig in absolutely subhuman, gut-wrenching conditions for a dollar a day, feeding cobalt up the supply chain into all the phones, all the tablets, and especially electric cars.”
British rapper Zuby recommended that his nearly one million followers watch the interview.
“This latest Joe Rogan Experience podcast is heavy,” he wrote. “If you have a smartphone or electric vehicle (that’s 100% of you) then I strongly recommend listening to it.”
Some, if not all, of the famous tech and energy companies in the world are implicated in the humanitarian crisis, Kara said.
“This is the bottom of the supply chain of your iPhone, of your Tesla, of your Samsung,” he asserted.
Fox News’ Thomas Catenacci contributed to this report.
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Carbon Nanotubes Could Revolutionize Everything From Batteries and Water Purifiers to Auto Parts and Sporting Goods
Vertically aligned carbon nanotubes growing from catalytic nanoparticles (gold color) on a silicon wafer on top of a heating stage (red glow). Diffusion of acetylene (black molecules) through the gas phase to the catalytic sites determines the growth rate in a cold-wall showerhead reactor. Credit: Image by Adam Samuel Connell/LLNL
Scientists at the Department of Energy’s Lawrence Livermore National Laboratory (LLNL) are scaling up the production of vertically aligned single-walled carbon nanotubes (SWCNT). This incredible material could revolutionize diverse commercial products ranging from rechargeable batteries, sporting goods, and automotive parts to boat hulls and water filters. The research was published recently in the journal Carbon.
Most carbon nanotube (CNT) production today is unorganized CNT architectures that is used in bulk composite materials and thin films. However, for many uses, organized CNT architectures, like vertically aligned forests, provide critical advantages for exploiting the properties of individual CNTs in macroscopic systems.
“Robust synthesis of vertically-aligned carbon nanotubes at large scale is required to accelerate deployment of numerous cutting-edge devices to emerging commercial applications,” said LLNL scientist and lead author Francesco Fornasiero. “To address this need, we demonstrated that the structural characteristics of single-walled CNTs produced at wafer scale in a growth regime dominated by bulk diffusion of the gaseous carbon precursor are remarkably invariant over a broad range of process conditions.”
The team of researchers discovered that the vertically oriented SWCNTs retained very high quality when increasing precursor concentration (the initial carbon) up to 30-fold, the catalyst substrate area from 1 cm2 to 180 cm2, growth pressure from 20 to 790 Mbar and gas flowrates up to 8-fold.
LLNL scientists derived a kinetics model that shows the growth kinetics can be accelerated by using a lighter bath gas to aid precursor diffusion. In addition, byproduct formation, which becomes progressively more important at higher growth pressure, could be greatly mitigated by using a hydrogen-free growth environment. The model also indicates that production throughput could be increased by 6-fold with carbon conversion efficiency of higher than 90% with the appropriate choice of the CNT growth recipe and fluid dynamics conditions.
“These model projections, along with the remarkably conserved structure of the CNT forests over a wide range of synthesis conditions, suggest that a bulk-diffusion-limited growth regime may facilitate preservation of vertically aligned CNT-based device performance during scale up,” said LLNL scientist and first author Sei Jin Park.
The team concluded that operating in a growth regime that is quantitatively described by a simple CNT growth kinetics model can facilitate process optimization and lead to a more rapid deployment of cutting-edge vertically-aligned CNT applications.
Applications include lithium-ion batteries, supercapacitors, water purification, thermal interfaces, breathable fabrics, and sensors.
Reference: “Synthesis of wafer-scale SWCNT forests with remarkably invariant structural properties in a bulk-diffusion-controlled kinetic regime” by Sei Jin Park, Kathleen Moyer-Vanderburgh, Steven F. Buchsbaum, Eric R. Meshot, Melinda L. Jue, Kuang Jen Wu and Francesco Fornasiero, 29 September 2022, Carbon.
DOI: 10.1016/j.carbon.2022.09.068
Other LLNL authors are Kathleen Moyer-Vanderburgh, Steven Buchsbaum, Eric Meshot, Melinda Jue and Kuang Jen Wu. The work is funded by the Chemical and Biological Technologies Department of the Defense Threat Reduction Agency.
Why BMW really decided to make batteries in the US
CNN
—
BMW recently announced a $1.7 billion investment to help prepare its huge Spartanburg, South Carolina, factory to produce electric cars and SUVs. That sum included $700 million for the construction of a battery manufacturing plant nearby.
Spartanburg is BMW’s largest factory anywhere in the world. It employs 11,000 people and produces 40,000 SUVs a year, only 40% of which are sold in North America. The rest are exported to 120 other countries.
It’s one of a number of such announcements in recent months and years as automakers gear up to start producing more electric vehicles. Mercedes, Hyundai, Honda, and others have also announced battery plant construction projects in recent months. BMW’s announcement came after the passage of the Biden administration’s Inflation Reduction Act, which limits tax incentives for electric vehicles to those with largely US-based battery manufacturing and raw materials supplies.
The rules allow consumer tax credits only for electric vehicles that meet increasingly strict goals for US-based manufacturing of the vehicles themselves, as well as their batteries. They also require US sourcing for battery raw materials and they place caps on the cost of the vehicles and the income of the buyers. Buyers can get full tax credits only if they, and the vehicles, meet the requirements.
But that sort of regulation had no impact on BMW’s decision to locate battery production in South Carolina, BMW chairman Oliver Zipse said in an interview with CNN Business. Simple logistics were a far more important factor.
“You will not fly hundred of kilograms of batteries around the world or put them on a ship,” he said. “You’re not going to do it. You’ll localize anyway.”
Not only were the IRA’s rules pushing American manufacturing unneeded, said Zipse, they also risk negative repercussions for the very American jobs they’re designed to protect, he said.
The IRA provides no benefit for vehicles, regardless of how “American made” they are, if they aren’t sold inside the US. More importantly, though, protectionist regulations attempting to wall off American-made vehicles for American buyers can spark retaliation, endangering valuable export business, said Zipse.
“You can never make a regulation without looking at the consequences from other regulators,” he said. “And I only warn that we get a tit-for-tat regulation.”
And, simply, as a practical matter, it’s difficult to wall off automaker’s supply chains in the way the IRA would seem to demand, Zipse said.
“The assumption that you can incentivize an industry which is completely from A to Z inside one region in the world, in such a complex industry, like the car industry is a wrong assumption,” he said.
Zipse also warned of the possible unintended consequences of regulations, like those in some US states and in Europe, that ban sales of non-zero-emission vehicles after a certain date. For one thing, it could mean overall industry sales will decline.
“We do not believe that this one drivetrain will make up the complete market of today’s size,” he said.
Not all consumers will be able to have electric vehicle chargers at home, Zipse said, so many could decide, instead, to keep their gasoline cars longer or buy used gas-powered cars.
Some automakers, like BMW competitors General Motors and Mercedes-Benz, are apparently not worried about that possibility of shrinking sales and have announced plans to go all-electric by a set future date. BMW has never said publicly that it intends to make only electric vehicles after any certain time.
Unlike some automakers, such as GM and Volkswagen, that make electric vehicles on distinct engineering platforms entirely different from their gasoline cars, BMW engineers its vehicles so they can be produced as electric, plug-in hybrid, or purely gasoline-powered. BMW executives tout this sort of flexibility to respond to market demands for different types of vehicles.
Instead, he said, regulators should impose gradually more stringent emissions restrictions while leaving it up to automakers how best to reach those targets, as regulators have done in the past. To date, that approach has not halted increasing global warming.
Zipse insisted that BMW can manage whatever regulators decide, however.
“We can easily ramp them up,” Zipse said of increasing regulatory demand for electric vehicles. “All our factories are qualified for building EVs. We have a flexible approach.”
Biden awards $2.8 billion to boost U.S. minerals output for EV batteries
WASHINGTON, Oct 19 (Reuters) – The Biden administration said on Wednesday it is awarding $2.8 billion in grants to boost U.S. production of electric vehicle batteries and the minerals used to build them, part of a bid to wean the country off supplies from China.
Albemarle Corp (ALB.N) is among the 20 manufacturing and processing companies receiving U.S. Energy Department grants to domestically mine lithium, graphite and nickel, build the first large-scale U.S. lithium processing facility, construct facilities to build cathodes and other battery parts, and expand battery recycling.
The grants, which are going to projects across at least 12 states, mark the latest push by the Biden administration to help reduce the country’s dependence on China and other nations for the building blocks of the green energy revolution.
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“As the world transitions from a fossil fuel to a clean energy powered economy, we cannot trade dependence on oil from autocrats like (Russian President Vladimir) Putin to dependence on critical minerals from China,” said a senior administration official briefing reporters on the program.
The funding recipients, first reported by Reuters, were chosen by a White House steering committee and coordinated by the Department of Energy with support from the Interior Department.
The funds are being doled out to a range of companies, some of which could self-fund projects and others that will see the grants as a financial lifeline to further expand their U.S. plans. The funding, though, does nothing to alleviate permitting challenges faced by some in the mining industry.
Albemarle is set to receive $149.7 million to build a facility in North Carolina to lightly process rock containing lithium from a mine it is trying to reopen. That facility would then feed a separate plant somewhere in the U.S. Southeast that the company said in June would produce as much lithium for EV batteries as the entire company produces today.
Albemarle, which also produces lithium in Australia and Chile, said the grant “increases the speed of lithium processing and reduces greenhouse gas emissions from long-distance transportation of raw minerals.”
Piedmont Lithium Inc (PLL.O) is receiving $141.7 million to build its own lithium processing facility in Tennessee, where the company will initially process the metal sourced from Quebec and Ghana. Piedmont’s plans to build a lithium mine in North Carolina have faced strong opposition.
Shares of Piedmont rose 7.5% after Reuters broke the news of its funding award earlier on Wednesday. Piedmont did not immediately respond to a request for comment.
Talon Metals Corp (TLO.TO) will receive $114.8 million to build a processing plant in North Dakota in a strategy shift for the company, which has a nickel supply deal with Tesla Inc (TSLA.O). Talon now aims to extract rock from its planned underground mine in Minnesota and ship it to a North Dakota processing facility that will be funded in part by the grant.
Talon said the grants are “a clear recognition that production of domestic nickel and other battery minerals is a national priority.”
Other grants include $316.2 million to privately-held Ascend Elements to build a battery parts plant, $50 million to privately-held Lilac Solutions Inc for a demonstration plant for so-called direct lithium extraction technologies, $75 million to privately-held Cirba Solutions to expand an Ohio battery recycling plant, and $219.8 million to Syrah Technologies LLC, a subsidiary of Syrah Resources Ltd (SYR.AX), to expand a graphite processing plant in Louisiana.
BIDEN’S GOAL
By 2030, President Joe Biden wants 50% of all new vehicles sold in the United States to be electric or plug-in hybrid electric models along with 500,000 new EV charging stations. He has not endorsed the phasing-out of new gasoline-powered vehicle sales by 2030.
Legislation Biden signed in August sets new strict battery component and sourcing requirements for $7,500 consumer EV tax credits. A separate $1 trillion infrastructure law signed in November 2021 allocates $7 billion to ensure U.S. manufacturers can access critical minerals and other necessary components to manufacture the batteries. The announcement on Wednesday was linked to that 2021 legislation.
The White House said in a fact sheet that the United States and allies do not produce enough of the critical minerals and materials used in EV batteries.
“China currently controls much of the critical mineral supply chain and the lack of mining, processing, and recycling capacity in the U.S. could hinder electric vehicle development and adoption, leaving the U.S. dependent on unreliable foreign supply chains,” the White House said.
In March, Biden invoked the Defense Production Act to support the production and processing of minerals and materials used for EV batteries.
The White House is also launching an effort, dubbed the American Battery Material Initiative, to strengthen critical mineral supply chains as automakers race to expand U.S. electric vehicle and battery production.
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Reporting by David Shepardson in Washington and Ernest Scheyder in Houston; Additional reporting by Nandita Bose; Editing by Bernadette Baum, Matthew Lewis and Paul Simao
Our Standards: The Thomson Reuters Trust Principles.
This underwater camera operates wirelessly without batteries
Enlarge / MIT engineers built a battery-free, wireless underwater camera that could help scientists explore unknown regions of the ocean, track pollution, or monitor the effects of climate change.
Adam Glanzman
MIT engineers have built a wireless, battery-free underwater camera, capable of harvesting energy by itself while consuming very little power, according to a new paper published in the journal Nature Communications. The system can take color photos of remote submerged objects—even in dark settings— and convey the data wirelessly for real-time monitoring of underwater environments, aiding the discovery of new rare species or monitoring ocean currents, pollution, or commercial and military operations.
We already have various methods of taking underwater images, but according to the authors, “Most of the ocean and marine organisms have not been observed yet.” That’s partly because most existing methods require being tethered to ships, underwater drones, or power plants for both power and communication. Those methods that don’t use tethering must incorporate battery power, which limits their lifetime. While it’s possible in principle to harvest energy from ocean waves, underwater currents, or even sunlight, adding the necessary equipment to do so would result in a much bulkier and more expensive underwater camera.
So the MIT team set about developing a solution for a battery-free, wireless imaging method. The design goal was to minimize the hardware required as much as possible. Since they wanted to keep power consumption to a minimum, for instance, the MIT team used cheap off-the-shelf imaging sensors. The trade-off is that such sensors only produce grayscale images. The team also needed to develop a low-power flash as well, since most underwater environments don’t get much natural light.
Enlarge / Overview of how the underwater backscatter imaging system works.
S.S. Afzal et al., 2022
The solution to both challenges turned out to incorporate red, green, and blue LEDs. The camera uses the red LED for in situ illumination and captures that image with its sensors, then repeats the process with the green and blue LEDs. The image might look black-and-white, per the authors, but the three colors of light from the LEDs are reflected in the white part of each image. So a full-color image can be reconstructed during post-processing.
“When we were kids in art class, we were taught that we could make all colors using three basic colors,” said co-author Fadel Adib. “The same rules follow for color images we see on our computers. We just need red, green, and blue—these three channels—to construct color images.”
Instead of a battery, the sensor relies on piezo-acoustic backscatter for ultra-low-power communication after the image data has been encoded as bits. This method doesn’t need to generate its own acoustic signal (as with sonar, for instance), relying instead on modulating reflections of incident underwater sounds to transmit data one bit at a time. That data is picked up by a remote receiver capable of recovering the modulated patterns, and the binary information is then used to reconstruct the image. The authors estimate that their underwater camera is about 100,000 times more energy-efficient than its counterparts, and could run for weeks on end.
Naturally, the team built a proof-of-concept prototype and did some testing to demonstrate that their method worked. For instance, they imaged pollution (in the form of plastic bottles) in Keyser Pond in southeastern New Hampshire, as well as imaging an African starfish (Protoreaster lincklii) in “a controlled environment with external illumination.” The resolution of the latter image was good enough to capture the various tubercles along the starfish’s five arms.
Enlarge / Sample images obtained using underwater backscatter imaging.
S.S.. Afzal et al., 2022
The team was also able to use their underwater wireless camera to monitor the growth of an aquatic plant (Aponogeton ulvaceus) over several days, and to detect and locate visual tags often used for underwater tracking and robotic manipulation. The camera achieved high detection rates and high localization accuracy up to a distance of about 3.5 meters (about 11 and a half feet); the authors suggest longer detection ranges could be achieved with higher-resolution sensors. Distance is also a factor in the camera’s energy harvesting and communication capabilities, per tests conducted in the Charles River in eastern Massachusetts. As expected, both those critical capabilities decrease with distance, although the camera successfully transmitted data 40 meters (131 feet) away from the receiver.
In short, “The tetherless, inexpensive, and fully-integrated nature of our method makes it a desirable approach for massive ocean deployments,” the authors wrote. Scaling up their approach requires more sophisticated and efficient transducers, as well as higher-power underwater acoustic transmissions. It’s possible that one could also make use of existing mesh networks of buoys on the ocean surface, or networks of underwater robots like Argo floats, to remotely power the energy-harvesting cameras.
“One of the most exciting applications of this camera for me personally is in the context of climate monitoring,” said Adib. “We are building climate models, but we are missing data from over 95 percent of the ocean. This technology could help us build more accurate climate models and better understand how climate change impacts the underwater world.”
DOI: Nature Communications, 2022. 10.1038/s41467-022-33223-x (About DOIs).
iPhone 14 Pro models to feature bigger batteries
Some more tidbits before the iPhone 14 event. According to Bloomberg‘s Mark Gurman in his Power On newsletter, the iPhone 14 Pro models will feature bigger batteries. This would be the second year in a row that Apple increases the battery size while improving processor performance. In addition, the company seems to be focusing on eSIM technology right from the box, instead of physical SIM cards.
This is not the first time 9to5Mac reports that the iPhone 14 series will get bigger batteries. In June, Twitter user ShrimpApplePro, who’s always been able to find rumors on Chinese social media about new Apple releases, shows a post that could confirm the size of the battery of the new regular and pro iPhones.
According to a Baidu post, the regular iPhone 14 could feature a 3,279 mAh battery compared to the iPhone 13, 3,227 mAh. The 14 Pro could use a 3,200 mAh battery, compared to the iPhone 13 Pro, 3,095 mAh. On the other hand, the 14 Pro Max would have a slightly smaller battery, with 4,323 mAh compared to the 13 Pro Max with 4,352 mAh.
Although Gurman doesn’t talk about the regular iPhone 14 models, would be really interesting if he’s right about the Pro models getting a bigger battery – which is something users always want.
Beyond the notch, I’m told to expect the iPhone 14 Pro models to appear slightly larger overall and include slimmer bezels. They will have bigger batteries too.
iPhone 14 Pro features roundup
Since this is his latest newsletter before the event, Gurman roundups what he expects Apple to introduce with these new iPhones. He says the regular iPhone 14 models will get “some camera hardware changes” and that’s it. He focuses on the iPhone 14 Pro versions. He writes:
- Front-facing camera to feature autofocus for the first time;
- Improved facial-recognition sensors;
- New 48MP wide-angle system;
- Improved telephoto and ultrawide-angle sensors;
- Enhancements to video recording and low light photography;
- A16 chip.
Last but not least, he talks about Apple’s push for eSIM technology. While it was rumored that the company could ditch the physical SIM card slot on the newer iPhone models, it’s unclear whether Apple will do just that for the iPhone 14 line. Gurman says:
And Apple will give eSIM a bigger push this time around, with carriers preparing to steer users toward the digital, embedded SIM cards rather than physical ones. In fact, Apple has considered removing the physical SIM card slot altogether beginning either this year or next for some models.
Are you excited about the iPhone 14 Pro announcement? Which model are you planning on buying? Share your thoughts in the comment section below.
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Tiny batteries that power our devices pose danger to children, report says
Despite public information campaigns warning parents about the dangers, visits to emergency rooms as a result of battery poisonings were twice as high from 2010 to 2019 compared with 1990 to 2009, according to the study published Monday in the journal Pediatrics.
That’s an average of one battery-related emergency visit every 1.25 hours among children under 18, the report found. Children under 5 were at highest risk, the report noted, especially toddlers between the ages of 1 and 2, who often put things they find into their mouths.
Even after removal from the device they’re powering, lithium button batteries still have a strong current. When the batteries get stuck in a child’s throat, saliva can interact with the current, which causes “a chemical reaction that can severely burn the esophagus in as little as two hours, creating an esophageal perforation, vocal cord paralysis, or even erosion into the airway (trachea), or major blood vessels,” warned the Children’s Hospital of Philadelphia.
“The battery literally burned a hole through his esophagus into his trachea (airway) allowing his stomach bile to reflux into his lungs,” the couple shared on Emmett’s Fight Foundation, the website of a nonprofit foundation they created to educate other parents on the dangers of button batteries.
The battery also burned the nerves of Emmett’s vocal cords, the Raunchs said. To deal with complications from his injuries, Emmett underwent six surgeries in five years, including the replacement of his entire esophagus using a portion of his bowel.
“As a mother I replay the morning we noticed Emmett’s illness over and over in my mind. How did I not know? If I only paid attention to the kind of batteries the remote controls required!” Karla Rauch wrote on a blog for Cincinnati Children’s Hospital.
Batteries are everywhere
Button batteries are all over modern homes, including some places you might not think about, such as blinking or animated ornaments, clip-on reading lights and singing greeting cards.
Other common items that contain lithium batteries are calculators, digital thermometers, flameless candles, flashing jewelry, handheld games and toys, hearing aids, laser pointers, light up bouncing balls, penlights, mini-remotes, step counters and athletic trackers, talking and singing books, and, of course, car key fobs and smartwatches, according to the National Poison Control Center.
The new study analyzed data from the US Consumer Product Safety Commission’s National Electronic Injury Surveillance System, which tracks emergency room visits in over 100 hospitals in the United States.
The analysis found ingesting the battery accounted for the majority (90%) of these battery-related emergency room visits, followed by putting batteries into the nose (5.7%), ears (2.5%) and mouth without swallowing (1.8%).
While not as serious as ingestion, lithium batteries stuck in an ear or nose can cause significant injuries, such as perforation of the nasal septum or the eardrum, hearing loss, or facial nerve paralysis, according to the report.
What should parents do?
Prevention is key. Don’t insert or change batteries in front of small children — shiny objects are enticing. Get rid of expired batteries immediately and safely, and store any replacement batteries well out of reach of children, experts recommend.
“Try to choose products with battery compartments that only open with a screwdriver or special tool, or that have a child-safe closure. At minimum, use strong tape to keep the compartment sealed tight against small hands,” advised Connecticut Children’s Hospital.
Be especially cautious about batteries that are as big as a penny or larger, the National Poison Control Center recommended.
“The 20 mm diameter lithium cell is one of the most serious problems when swallowed. These problem cells can be recognized by their imprint (engraved numbers and letters) and often have one of these 3 codes: CR2032, CR2025, CR2016. If swallowed and not removed promptly, these larger button batteries can cause death — or burn a hole through your child’s esophagus,” the center noted.
Always supervise children who are playing with a toy or device that contains a button battery, and educate older children about the dangers so they can assist.
What if you suspect your child has swallowed a battery — or put one in their nose or ear?
“Call the National Battery Ingestion Hotline at 800-498-8666 immediately. Prompt action is critical. Don’t wait for symptoms to develop,” the NPCC advised.
Signs of ingestion can look like the child swallowed a coin, so be wary, experts said. Typical behavior can include wheezing, drooling, coughing, vomiting, chest discomfort, refusal to eat, or gagging when attempting to drink or eat. But for some children, like Emmett Rauch, it can take days before symptoms are severe enough to notice.
“It’s also important to know if a magnet was co-ingested with the battery, as this could potentially cause further injury. X-rays of the child’s entire neck, esophagus and abdomen are typically necessary,” according to Texas Children’s Hospital.
If you suspect ingestion, don’t make your child vomit, Texas Children’s advised.
Don’t give your child anything to eat or drink until an X-ray shows the battery has moved beyond the esophagus, the National Poison Control Center noted.
“Batteries stuck in the esophagus must be removed as quickly as possible as severe damage can occur in just 2 hours. Batteries in the nose or ear also must be removed immediately to avoid permanent damage,” the center advised.
Why you can’t always throw AA batteries in the trash
There’s no shortage of conflicting messages on what to do with your dead alkaline batteries, which include AA, AAA, C, D and 9-volt. Governments and battery makers don’t have consistent and clear policies for disposing of the alkaline batteries that power many of our small electric devices like remote controls, flashlights, clocks and toys. They even differ depending on where you live.
Typical alkaline batteries like AAs include steel, zinc, manganese, potassium and graphite, according to Energizer, which sells alkaline batteries. Energy is generated when the zinc and manganese interact.
Manganese is an essential nutrient, but at high levels it can cause adverse health impacts. Former manganese miners and smelters have suffered permanent neurological damage. With any battery there’s risk of chemicals leaching into soil, surface water and ground water. Polluted water and crops can lead to diseases like cancer. But alkaline batteries are not especially toxic compared to other battery types.
The Environmental Protection Agency acknowledges that in most communities batteries can be safely put in the trash. But it recommends sending your alkaline batteries like AAs to a battery recycler. Which doesn’t necessarily mean you can throw the batteries in your regular recycling bin.
A huge exception to this is California, which classifies batteries as hazardous waste. The state says they’re hazardous because of the metals, toxic and corrosive materials that batteries contain. Residents are instructed to take AA and all batteries to hazardous waste disposal facilities. No other state also classifies batteries as hazardous waste. But some local governments call for recycling AA batteries and have programs to do so.
The District of Columbia tells residents to drop off AA batteries for recycling at a designated location, but not in their recycling bins. Seattle residents are encouraged to take their AA batteries to hazardous waste facilities.
“Tossing a handful of batteries in the trash may not seem like a big deal, it adds up: around 180,000 tons of batteries are discarded in the U.S. every year,” the city cautions.
Others places like Chicago refuse to take alkaline batteries at recycling facilities.
Major metropolitan areas within a couple hours of each other can have dramatically different policies. Austin, Texas cautions that batteries should never be thrown in dumpsters or curbside trash. Houston, Texas, says it’s okay to put batteries in the trash. Some retailers like Home Depot say you may toss alkaline batteries in with ordinary trash.
Many places that call for putting AA batteries in the trash say it’s reasonable because they no longer contain mercury following a 1996 law. (Mercury was previously in batteries to help prevent corrosion.) The 1996 law also led to the creation of Call 2 Recycle, a non-profit organization originally created by battery manufacturers, which offers consumers battery recycling options.
What to do with your batteries also isn’t necessarily clearer if you check with manufacturers. Duracell encourages customers to check with local and state regulations, as well as check out recycling options.
Amazon sells AA batteries under its Basics line of goods that include a symbol of a receptacle with a large X over it, that appears like it may be a trash bin, or a recycling bin.
The crossed-out symbol means the product needs to be disposed of separately from household waste and typical recycling bins, according to Amazon spokesperson Betsy Harden.
Harden added that Amazon recommends following EPA and local regulations.