The United States Postal Service (USPS) will be prohibiting international shipments of devices containing lithium ion batteries starting May 16th. After coming to grips with serious financial problems last year, USPS has now decided that lithium batteries pose too great of a risk to be shipped overseas. Devices like smartphones, laptops, and tablets will fall under this ban, but domestic shipment of these products will be unaffected.

USPS has revised its Domestic Mail Manual — an official document outlining shipment policies — after evaluating recent discussions by the International Civil Aviation Organiza­tion and the Universal Postal Union. Meanwhile, UPS and FedEx are not changing their stance on the matter, which isn't surprising considering how much money is involved. The international shipment of electronic goods is a multi-billion dollar industry, and the added risk associated with transporting devices with lithium batteries is a gamble these companies are willing to take. The only problem is that neither of these couriers will deliver to APO, FPO, or DPO addresses overseas, meaning that troops abroad will not be able to receive Kindles and iPads to fill the downtime between combat.

An outright ban on air-shipping lithium batteries may seem like an exaggerated response to this ambiguous problem, but there have been several plane crashes directly attributed to exploding lithium batteries in the last few years. There are two reasons why a lithium battery might experience a runaway thermal expansion, or explosion. The first reason lies with the battery's chemistry, and the second is contingent on physical or environmental stress.

PLEASANTON, Calif. — A big rig carrying flammable chemicals slammed into the center divider of Highway 680 near Pleasanton late Sunday, jackknifing and triggering a traffic slowdown that lasted for nearly seven hours, according to the California Highway Patrol.
Livermore-Pleasanton Fire Battalion Chief Jack Neiman-Kimel said the accident required the deployment of a hazmat team because included among the truck’s load was “a couple drums of some hazardous material. He has a drum of lithium and a drum of Trimethylgallium.”
Both chemicals are used in the production process of semiconductors and electric batteries and can catch fire when exposed to air.
Neiman-Kimel said about 100 gallons of diesel fuel did leak out of the truck and also had to be cleaned up.

General Motors Co. officials say damage could hit $5 million following an explosion last week in a battery-testing lab at its Tech Center in Warren, according to a police report obtained by The Detroit News. The blast injured an employee who remained in the hospital Tuesday.

GM Facility Manager Mo Abraham, and Krishon Davis, who works in GM fire prevention, told Warren police that damage "could reach the $5 million mark."

A separate Warren Fire Department report from last Wednesday's explosion estimated $3 million in damage, with property losses at $1 million and contents at $2 million. Warren Fire Commissioner Skip McAdams said Tuesday he estimates the loss is closer to $3 million than $5 million. The figure could change when a full fire investigation report is completed.

GM said last week the explosion was created by gases that vented from an experimental battery pack inside an enclosed room in its battery lab in the Alternative Energy Center building. GM likened the incident to a natural gas explosion, as gases from a battery gathered in the room during extreme testing and ignited.

GM would not comment directly Tuesday on damage estimates cited in the reports.

General Motors Co. was quick to fend off new fears about electric cars Wednesday, after the company said an explosion was caused by gases venting from an experimental battery pack inside a battery lab at the General Motors Tech Center in Warren. The explosion led to the hospitalization of one employee.

The 8:45 a.m. incident inside a small room at the lab was likened by GM to a natural gas explosion, as gases from a battery gathered in the room during extreme testing and ignited. GM said the battery pack remained intact.

One worker who was injured was being kept for observation overnight at an area hospital, said GM spokesman Alan Adler. He declined to release the extent of the man's injuries, nor what he did in the lab.

Four other people were evaluated by medical personnel after the explosion blew out windows and damaged at least part of the global battery lab inside the Alternative Energy Center.

The Detroit automaker, just a few hours after the incident, was quick to point out that the battery being tested was unrelated to the Chevrolet Volt or any other production vehicle.

General Motors employee who was seriously injured in a battery lab explosion Wednesday is expected to stay in the hospital for another day, a spokesman said this morning.

The unidentified man was taken to a St. John Hospital and Medical Center in Detroit after chemical gases ignited during battery tests Wednesday morning at the GM Technical Center in Warren.

GM spokesman Alan Adler confirmed that the injured man would stay at the hospital today but did not have any more details.

The battery lab sustained “significant” structural damage and equipment was also damaged in the blast, a fire department official said.

GM said the Alternative Energy Center, where the explosion occurred, would be open today – except for the battery lab and nearby offices.

The Wall Street Journal reported that the explosion involved batteries manufactured by A123 Systems for the forthcoming electric version of the Chevrolet Spark.

GM declined to confirm the source of the battery that was involved in the incident.

A123 has come under scrutiny after reporting manufacturing defects in batteries delivered to electric vehicle start-up Fisker Automotive.

But GM has said researchers put batteries through rigorous stress tests – and analysts said accidents weren’t altogether uncommon in the early days of a new technology.

Warren— General Motors Co. said a Wednesday incident at a battery lab in the General Motors Technical Center that seriously injured one person was unrelated to the Chevrolet Volt or any other production vehicle, but was related to "extreme testing on a prototype battery."

Four others were evaluated after reports of a lithium battery exploding at a battery research lab at the GM Tech Center.

"We are aware of an incident this morning about 8:45 a.m. in one of the laboratories at the Alternative Energy Center at the General Motors Technical Center in Warren, Mich.," GM said in a release. "Fire and emergency authorities were called to the scene. The building was evacuated. All employees have been accounted for. We are aware of five employees being evaluated on scene by medical personal and only one employee is being further treated.

RIDGEWOOD – Firefighters evacuated a five-story building at 45 North Broad St. Sunday following reports of a sulfuric acid odor coming from the basement.

Tenants of the commercial and office building, known as The Lincoln Building, were kept out for two hours as the Bergen County Hazardous Materials unit investigated. Fire and police officials said they did not know how many people were in the building at the time of evacuation.

Six people were medically evaluated on the scene, but no one required additional medical treatment. The Ridgewood Fire Department responded to the scene at about 3 p.m. and swept thorough the building wearing air packs to make sure everyone was out, said fire Capt. Robert Kozielski. He said carbon monoxide levels were elevated in the building.

The fire crews ventilated the building with power fans until Hazmat investigators determined it was safe to occupy, Kozielski said.

The leak was caused by a malfunctioning battery in the basement. Batteries and other equipment are stored in the basement to support cellphone towers located at the downtown building.

A chemical spill forced the closure of a residential road for three hours last night.

Fifteen fire engines from across south-west London rushed to Elm Crescent, in Kingston, after a battery in a CCTV van overheated and corrosive acid leaked into the road.

A truck filled with about 1,000 old equipment batteries caught fire in the Town of Wallkill on Tuesday, completely blocking off a section of Route 211 for six hours with foul-smelling black smoke.

The truck was headed for Revere Smelting and Refining Corp. on Ballard Road at around 10:15 a.m. when the driver noticed the trailer was on fire and pulled onto 84 Lane, the road leading to the Gander Mountain and Middletown Honda businesses.

After the driver reported the chemical fire, multiple fire and emergency responder companies responded, spraying foam and mist onto the truck, then water to douse the rest of the flames, according to town Supervisor Dan Depew.

The fire itself took about 20 minutes to put out, but forced Route 211 traffic to turn around for much of the day.

Emergency responders surrounded the truck with retention pools in order to help contain hazardous chemicals.

Five Scott County Sheriff's Deputies and a Kentucky State trooper arrived at a home on North Dividing Ridge, near Sadieville, on a tip that there was a possible meth lab inside. Once inside, the officers confronted two men, Jeremy Centers and Philip Jean, the KSP says Centers then went and began to dispose of the evidence, and in the process put everyone's lives in jeopardy.

"It's a very, very dangerous situation that could have been a lot worse," described Kentucky State Trooper, Ron Turley.


"Their meth lab contained lithium batteries, and anytime lithium batteries and water mix, you have a fire, or explosion. It also causes a very toxic fume that caused some bronchial irritation [for everyone exposed]," he explained.

Neighbors, nearby, say they suspected something was wrong at the mobile home, "Yeah, it kind of worried me, there," said Allie Morrison, who lives just a few yards away.

General Motors Co. (GM)’s electric plug- in hybrid Chevrolet Volt is the subject of a U.S. safety probe after its lithium-ion batteries, supplied by LG Chem Ltd., caught fire in crash tests.
A Volt caught fire three weeks after a side-impact crash test May 12 while parked at a testing center in Wisconsin, leading regulators to conduct more tests. Volt battery packs were damaged in three more tests last week, causing two fires, the National Highway Traffic Safety Administration said yesterday in a statement on its website.
“The agency is concerned that damage to the Volt’s batteries as part of three tests that are explicitly designed to replicate real-world crash scenarios have resulted in fire,” NHTSA said in the statement.
The U.S. regulator said it doesn’t know of any crashes outside of testing that have led to battery-related fires in Volts or other cars powered by lithium-ion batteries. Chevy Volt owners whose vehicles have not been in a serious crash don’t need to be concerned, the agency said.

EASTON, Md.- Authorities say Easton Memorial Hospital's emergency room had to be temporarily shut down Tuesday morning due to a hazmat situation.

Talbot County Emergency Services Director Clay Stamp said that at around 4:30 a.m., a battery on a computer cart exploded and emitted an odor. Stamp said there were no major injuries.

"At no time was the hospital closed, just the emergency department was closed. The rest of the hospital was isolated. The hvac system was shut down to prevent the spread of the odor," said Stamp.

Environmental Impacts: An investigation is launched into the possibility of battery fires occurring in crashes involving Government Motors' touted electric car. Industrial policy meets the law of unintended consequences.

The National Highway Traffic Safety Administration has announced an investigation into the safety of electric cars using lithium batteries, particularly the Chevy Volt, after a battery fire occurred after a side-impact crash test.

It has asked other manufacturers who make electric cars or that plan to do so for information on how they handle lithium-ion batteries. The request also includes recommendations for minimizing fire risk. The feds say this is only precautionary and there is no indication of widespread risk. GM insists the Volt is safe.

The fire didn't break out in the test vehicle until three weeks after the crash. GM says there have been no reports from consumers of battery problems, and the feds say they've been unable to duplicate the fire problem.

But the cumulative road experience of the brand-new and poorly selling vehicle has been limited.

The Volt fire was severe enough to burn vehicles parked nearby. In the crash test, metal punctured the battery.

FIREFIGHTERS were called to deal with  chemical incident in Harlow on Monday (October 31) after a forklift truck collided with two heavy duty truck batteries on charge, causing one to explode.
Crews from Harlow, Old Harlow, Waltham Abbey and two from Loughton were sent to Sims Recycling on the River Way Industrial Estate at 11am. When they arrived they found one of the batteries was leaking to and two people had suffered injuries.
Crews safely dealt with the incident by 11.49am and the casualties were placed in the care of the ambulance service.

Chicago - Chicago emergency crews responded to a Hazmat situation at O'Hare Airport Tuesday when an airline employee was injured handling baggage.

According to Chicago Fire Department Commander Will Knight, the fire department responded to O’Hare for an incident which what was believed to be a battery in a shipping container exploded while being handled by a United Airlines employee.

A strange odor caused a scare in Charlottesville Thursday afternoon.  Firefighters had to evacuate a building inside the Fontaine Research Park for several hours.

Shortly before 1 p.m. Thursday, a pair of batteries overheated and exploded in the basement.  That sent battery acid spilling onto the floor.

A Charlottesville hazmat crew was on scene cleaning up the spill.  No one was injured.

"You obviously don't want to be in the area when the battery acid is dispersed.  It's a caustic agent.  It's an acidic, so it can burn you," said Chief Charles Werner with the Charlottesville Fire Department.

Those batteries were a part of the building's backup electricity system.  The explosion caused minimal damage.  After clean up, hazmat crews remained on scene to ventilate the building before allowing workers back in.

44,000 pounds of batteries caught fire in the trailer of a big rig, closing the right lane of I-81 in East Hanovor Township.  The trucks brakes caught fire, which spread to the tires, and then to theload of batteries in the trailer.  No one was injured and HazMat crews will be on scene cleaning up the aftermath.

FIREFIGHTERS were tackling a chemical alert at a North-East factory unit this afternoon.

Reports were received of the chemical release from Rayovac Micro Power Ltd, at Washington, shortly after 2pm.

Chemical fumes were said to be coming from a waste storage unit within the factory, which produces batteries for hearing aids, on Stephenson Industrial Estate.

UPDATE: 9/1/11 @ 7:05 p.m.
CHARLESTON, W.Va. (WSAZ) -- It's a situation even experts couldn't predict as a group of meteorologists were caught off guard when a strange odor forced them out of their office and turned out to be toxic fumes from battery acid.

Employees at the National Weather Service in Charleston say they first noticed something wasn't right about 7:30 Thursday morning.

A couple hours later, emergency crews shut down Parkway Road off of Corridor G, allowing hazmat teams to move in.

"We started to smell something and we thought it almost smelled like chlorine or something electrical before we tracked it down and found out in fact it was battery acid," meteorologist Alan Rezek said. "As soon as we called 911, boom, they were here to take care of it."

Leaking battery acid was caused by a malfunction in the back-up power supply.

Taking every precaution possible, employees evacuated the building and no one was hurt.

"We didn't want to look any further we wanted to let the professionals do that," Rezek said.

Emergency crews cut power to the batteries and that stopped the leak.

Police have determined that an incident that sent 10 people to the hospital Friday morning from a plant in Covington resulted from the accidental release of a battery chemical.

"We're getting good news, that this is not a contaminant, a foreign agent placed inside the battery," Covington Police Capt. Ken Malcom told Channel 2 Action News. "It was just an accident, an explosion within the contents of the battery."

The incident happened at Pure Talk, a phone manufacturing company on Lochridge Boulevard. Malcom said around 2:30 a.m. Friday, an employee opened a package containing batteries. Two of the batteries were fused together, and when an employee separated them, a white powder was released.

"This employee immediately started feeling a burning sensation on the hands, a numbing sensation" on the eyes and skin, Malcom said. "Immediately the other employees in the business began feeling similar effects of exposure to this powder."

COVINGTON, Ga. -- Investigators are trying to figure out who deliberately left behind a white powdery substance at a Newton County plant. Now, nearly a dozen people are sick.
Ten people from the Pure Talk battery company are recovering at the Newton Medical Center. Police said all 10 are being decontaminated after being exposed to a white powder around 2:30 a.m.
Investigators said one of the employees at the company received a box full of cellphone batteries and two of the batteries were fused together. They said the employee tried to separate the batteries and a white powder was released.
Nine other employees were exposed to the powder, investigators said.
Those employees started complaining of burning eyes, burning skin and numbness in their hands, according to authorities.
Police said the employees drove themselves to the Newton Medical Center emergency room where they are currently being treated.
Convington police said there was a note attached to the box, leading them to believe this was a deliberate act.
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Seven people received minor injuries Tuesday morning in an industrial accident at All Tech, 34300 Lakeland Blvd. in Eastlake.

According to the Eastlake Fire Department, a chemical reaction from batteries caused a small explosion and small fire at the factory, which recycles old computers, computer parts and batteries.

“The cause dealt with lithium batteries, and those are air- and water-reactive, so we think somehow they were exposed to air, which created a very small fire. However, it generated a lot of smoke,” Fire Chief Ted Whittington said.

Several employees received minor injuries, but were not taken to a hospital.

One man was reported to be in urgent condition Saturday night from injuries suffered when a lithium battery exploded at a plant in Conroe’s industrial park.
Conroe Assistant Fire Chief Paul Sims said firefighters were dispatched to 750 Conroe Park North Drive – located between Pollock Drive and TxDOT Road – around 6:30 p.m. They found one man outside the building and another still inside.
Both men were transported to nearby hospitals.
The man found outside the building was in stable condition, while the other man had burns and lacerations, Sims said.
While Sims said there was no indication what caused the explosion, one of the lithium batteries was located at one end of a pipe.
Sims said vinyl chloride was present in the building, a chemical that becomes “deadly” when in contact with water.
“The explosion cut a hole in the ceiling, which ruptured a water line,” he said.
Conroe’s HazMat unit was dispatched to the scene, and the Conroe Police Department cordoned off an area around the plant to control any traffic.

HOUSTON (KTRK) -- A firefighter was injured after a fire and shelter-in-place at NASA Johnson Space Center.

The Houston Fire Department says it was dispatched to a building fire with HazMat at JSC just after 9:30am Monday morning.
HFD says a battery was being tested inside a containment system when it overheated and caught some of the insulation on fire. Initially, it was believed that one of the bi-products of combustion could be dangerous so NASA issued a shelter-in-place for the facility.
HazMat conducted air monitoring and revised the shelter-in-place to include only the building of origin.
HFD said the fire was extinguished just before 11:30am.
One firefighter was injured when a hydrant cap blew off and struck him in the knee. There were no other reported injuries.

Nick Sitts was driving a solar vehicle north along 15th Street toward the formation area of the da Vinci Days parade shortly after 11 a.m. Saturday when he heard a pop.
Moments later there was an explosion, and soon the $100,000 vehicle was engulfed in flames.
Sitts got out just in time - right after he heard that initial pop, said Hai Yue Han, co-captain of the Oregon State University Solar Vehicle Team, which constructed the vehicle from 2008 to 2010.
"If it had been a few moments later, he may have not made it out alive," Han said.
Sitts' sister, Danielle, also a member of the team, was in an escort car ahead of solar vehicle when the explosion occurred. She looked back and saw smoke.
"I was more scared than I'd every been in my life," she said. "My brother was in a car that was on fire."
Sitts' wife, Elizabeth, was in a trail vehicle with their soon-to-be-1-year-old baby Penelope and two others sisters of Nick, Nicole and Cheyenne Sitts. Elizabeth helped pull her husband away from the burning vehicle, Danielle said.
Sitts had first- and second-degree burns to his arms and face and some singed hair. "He looked like he had a bad sunburn, she said. "He lost a shoe; it disintegrated."
Sitts, 23, a junior chemical engineering major from Scappoose, was treated at Good Samaritan Regional Medical Center. He was released mid-afternoon Saturday and was resting at home in Corvallis. His parents arrived from the Portland area to assist him.
"He seemed to be in very good spirits considering the accident and injuries he suffered," said Steve Clark, OSU vice president of OSU relations.
Han believes the explosion was caused by a short in one of the battery cells. Each of the 28 battery packs contains 20 small cylindrical lithium-ion battery cells - a total of 568.
Some of the battery cells landed in the OSU parking lot on the east side of 15th. The explosion occurred about 50 yards south of the Kerr Administration Building.

A car battery which was accidentally left on a charger overnight brought members of the Port aux Basques Volunteer Fire Department’s hazmat unit to the Canadian Tire store last Wednesday.
 
Fire Chief Jerry Musseau said when staff at the store arrived that morning, there was a smoky haze and a strong smell from the battery throughout the store. Although there was no fire, the battery had overheated through the night and let off fumes.
Staff stayed long enough to open doors and windows but nobody lingered in the building, according to Chief Musseau. All employees who were inside the store were sent to hospital for precautionary checkups. Everyone was fine, according to the fire chief.
Members from the fire department arrived on scene and blocked off the parking lot. The hazmat team then suited up and went into the store to check the air quality.
“We went in with some gas detection equipment to make sure there was nothing in the air and there wasn’t, other than a very strong rotten smell in the store,” said Chief Musseau.
He said the smell was from the sulfur in the battery, but it wasn’t harmful.
The department used a large fan to vent the entire building for an hour and a half.

Traffic was snarled Wednesday afternoon when two batteries fell from a truck at 17th and G streets at the on-ramp to state Route 94 in downtown San Diego.

The incident occurred shortly after 2 p.m. A hazardous-materials crew was sent to neutralize the acid with a soda-ash solution, a San Diego Fire-Rescue Department dispatcher said.

A driver hit one of the batteries and ruptured it, but no one was injured.

CARTERSVILLE, Ga. -- Firefighters have finally been able to make entry into a battery recycling facility in Cartersville that caught fire Saturday afternoon.

Firefighters and witnesses at the scene said the batteries started exploding from the fire.

Emergency crews told Channel 2's George Howell that they began evacuating neighbors in the area because they weren't sure what kind of chemicals were in the batteries.

Hazmat crews were also at the scene helping with the situation.

Channel 2's Erica Byfield learned from officials at the Cartersville Medical Center, that eight people from the surrounding neighborhood were taken the hospital because of possible exposure.

FOXBORO - Local firefighters, water department workers and a state hazardous materials team responded this afternoon to a chemical incident inside a town water pumping station off Mechanic Street.

First thought to be a spill of chemicals used by the water department, the problem was caused by the explosion of a truck-type battery on a water pump engine, officials said.

The incident began about 2 p.m.

In an initial report about 4 p.m., authorities suspected that about five gallons of potassium hydroxide had leaked at a pipe fitting in the station building.

EL PASO - A chain reaction crash involving five cars and two tractor-trailer trucks backed up traffic on I-10 East this afternoon.
The crash occurred about 2:30 today on I-10 East near Cotton. One of the tractor-trailer trucks spilled a load of car batteries, slowing the cleanup.

A Gwinnett County metal trash bin fire is out and fire officials are waiting for crews to clean up the resulting chemical release near North Berkley Lake.

Around 2 p.m., firefighters responded to reports of a fire from a large roll-off trash container holding household and car batteries in the 6200 block of Peachtree Industrial Boulevard, Gwinnett County fire spokesman Lt. Eric Eberly said.

After initially attacking the fire with water, firefighters let the fire burn, because adding water to chemicals in the batteries would create hydrochloric acid, Eberly said.

The initial fire crew was exposed to chemical gases, and four fighters were treated for exposure.

No nearby businesses were closed, and crews protected storm drains from runoff and closed North Berkley Lake around the Peachtree Industrial Boulevard area, Eberly said.

Return to ajc.com for more updates.