In recent years, as electrochemical energy storage power stations have been widely used, their safety issues have become increasingly prominent. According to publicly available accident statistics, since 2017 to 2024, there have been more than 89 cumulative storage safety accidents worldwide, with South Korea becoming the hardest hit area, followed by the United States, and the safety situation is not optimistic. As of September 2024, there have been more than ten fires in the lithium-ion battery industry worldwide.

This series of tragedies has not only triggered the public's deep concern about the safety of lithium batteries but also made the fire safety standards for energy storage a hot topic of discussion within and outside the industry. Currently, China has issued two core national standards in the field of electrochemical fire safety: Code for Design of Electrochemical Energy Storage Power Stations GB51048-2014 and GB/T 42288-2022 Safety Regulations for Electrochemical Energy Storage Power Stations. As the first national standard for electrochemical energy storage power stations in China, the significance of GB51048-2014 is self-evident. This standard focuses on the planning and design phases of energy storage power stations, providing the industry with a basic framework for construction, ensuring that energy storage projects adhere to safe and standardized principles from the initial stages. Meanwhile, GB/T 42288-2022 further refines the safety regulations for energy storage, offering more detailed guidance for the daily operation and maintenance of energy storage power stations, filling gaps in industry management.

The most intuitive and crucial aspect of arranging energy storage equipment is to effectively achieve fire prevention isolation, preventing accident expansion during a fire. In previous designs, the fire separation distance and equipment arrangement generally followed customary practices with limited reference materials. When a fire occurs in an energy storage power station, the flames expand continuously and may even spread to adjacent prefabricated modules or other buildings. Therefore, while enhancing the fire resistance rating of prefabricated module materials, it is necessary to increase the fire separation distance between prefabricated modules and other buildings, especially the fire separation distance directly opposite the prefabricated module door, to prevent the flames from spreading out of the prefabricated module and endangering nearby prefabricated modules.

Fire Protection Distance:

In the fire safety management notice for electrochemical energy storage power stations released by the Inner Mongolia Autonomous Region, the fire separation distance between lithium battery prefabricated modules has been expanded to three times that of other local standards (≥12m), and the separation distance for a single partition not exceeding 50MWh (10 prefabricated modules) is doubled from the GB 51048-2014 standard (≥20m).

In recent years, with the frequent occurrence of lithium battery energy storage fires worldwide, the losses and impacts of these accidents have drawn attention from safety departments in various countries. The release of the Notice on Several Measures for Fire Safety Management of Electrochemical Energy Storage Power Stations by the Inner Mongolia Safety Committee, which increases the requirements for the spacing between lithium battery prefabricated modules and partitions, is undoubtedly aimed at further preventing potential safety hazards associated with lithium battery energy storage. To some extent, safe spacing can reduce the occurrence of large-scale accidents. This is just the beginning; subsequently, countries may adopt more stringent safety and fire protection standards for the construction of lithium-ion energy storage power stations.

Expanding the spacing between battery prefabricated modules and partitions will increase the land area and construction investment required for lithium battery energy storage power station construction, especially when constructing large-scale energy storage facilities, where the land area will expand exponentially. Compared to lithium batteries, flow batteries, despite having a lower energy density, offer inherent safety advantages and do not require excessive safety spacing. When building large-scale energy storage facilities, they can achieve a smaller land footprint, offering greater safety and economic advantages. For instance, the urban peak-shaving flow battery power station in Dalian has a capacity of 400MWh and covers an area of only 29,000 square meters, averaging 7,200 square meters per 100MWh, which is better than the land area requirement for lithium batteries under the aforementioned conditions. Therefore, in addition to its safety benefits, flow batteries also provide the advantage of saving land, further promoting the widespread implementation of this technology.

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