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Tesla Fires and Firestorms: Let's Breathe and Review Some Car Fire Math
cartechboy writes "There are about 150,000 vehicle fires reported every year in the U.S. — about 17 every hour, on average. But when that vehicle fire is a Tesla, the Internet notices. There have now been three fires among roughly 20,000 Tesla Model S electric cars on the road so far. The stock is down, the Feds are asking questions and the Internet is swimming in Tesla news. It may be time to check the facts and review some math (hint: we're looking at roughly one fire for every 33 million miles driven so far) and then breathe. Then look at what we know, what we don't know, and what we should know."
Generally conventional cars burn when they are old. Calculate how many cars up to one year old are burning in comparison to Tesla.
I was looking to purchase some TSLA, here is my opportunity.
1. Stored energy is a hazard
2. Humans are fragile
3. Therefore create barriers between humans and stored energy.
Any self-powered vehicle with useful range needs a lot of stored energy. This can be in a form that drips and pours out of any opening in can find, like gasoline, or it can be chemical energy in a solid battery.
Tesla engineers implemented point 3 so well that the guy in Auburn opened the door and walked away from the uncontrolled release of energy happening in front of him.
Complete non-story, until they start catching fire spontaneously on the road like my neighbor's New Beetle.
[Assuming that fuel fires and battery fires are equally weighted as far as severity goes, which is obviously some frictionless-perfect-sphere-style handwaving...]
Let's say with gasoline-powered cars, the risk of fuel fire is 1%, and the risk of battery fire is 0.01%. The odds of your car igniting is 1.01%.
And let's say Tesla has effectively eliminated fuel fires, but it's now 50 times more likely that your battery start a fire. That's a 0.50% possibility of your car igniting.
All other things being equal, I'll take the car that is half as likely to catch on fire.
(Yes, the numbers are all made up, but the point is, I don't care WHAT lights my car on fire; I only care how likely it is that my car will light on fire. Therefore, I think it makes sense to look at all vehicle fires.)
The vehicle carries energy. It's pretty much irrelevant whether that energy is stored as gasoline or inside a huge battery -- whenever there is a large amount of energy around, there is the potential of shit igniting.
CLI paste? paste.pr0.tips!
Was the author getting any financial supprt from the Tesla car company ?
Really, you're going with that? Who paid you to post that? (So sick of people claiming anyone with a different opinion must be paid to post. I'd be rich if I had a hundred bucks for every time I'm accused of being Paid by X, only to be accused of being paid by X's competitors on the next post, often in the same thread.). You've been around here long enough to know better.
What the fuel source is has nothing to do with the statistics at hand. Fires per mile traveled is as good a measure as any other.
The fact remains that every self automobile has a combustible substance on board. Some burn less than others. Comparing power sources for safety is a perfectly normal thing to do, and when you do it, electricity looks way safer than gasoline.
Why is that so hard for your to see?
Sig Battery depleted. Reverting to safe mode.
The real threat to the auto industry is the Tesla distribution model that has all the dealers in the US up in arms.
Exactly.
Every dealer is gunning for Tesla, even while the big US automakers and the Japan automakers are secretly hoping Tesla can prove
this distribution model works. They would all secretly love to sell direct.
But dealers are going to point out every flaw with Tesla to everyone who will listen.
In the meantime The Volt, Leaf, and Tesla will probably all add Kevlar battery protection, thermal breaks between battery segments and go about their business just as Boeing did.
Sig Battery depleted. Reverting to safe mode.
When a new expensive electric vehicle catches fire, it is news. Maybe not stop-the-presses news, but news nonetheless.
Yup. Comes down to observer bias, just like nuclear energy. A nuke plant has an accident that results in a tiny leak of radioactive steam (resulting in exactly 0 deaths)? OH NOES!! THE WURST THING EVAR!!!!! But if a coal power plant spits out literally TONS of CO2, ash, soot (and even radioactive isotopes that were in the coal!), and that's a "Meh".