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EMERGENCY RESPONSE APPROACHES FOR
ELECTRIC AND HYBRID VEHICLES IN TURKEY

Orhan TOPAL

ABSTRACT
Electric & hybrid vehicles, which are increasingly used in traffic in daily
life, pose a significant risk for possible traffic accidents. There are fire risks
originating from high voltage drive batteries due to mechanical deformations
that may occur in accident situations involving electric & hybrid vehicles and/
or sometimes in cases where adequate maintenance & repairmen processes.
These risks are usually due to the exposure of the cells of the high voltage
drive battery to a situation outside the defined operating range in terms of
mechanical, thermal or electrical. These conditions cause the temperature
to rise and therefore the battery cells to heat up. This temperature increase
also accelerates unwanted chemical reactions in the cells, so causing higher
temperature levels to be reached. It can be also induced the high voltage
propulsion batteries to enter a self-reinforcing and unstoppable chemical
reaction cycle. In a similar process, even the thermal runaway situation on
the basis of only one cell causes thermal risks that can spread to all other
modules and even affect the propulsion battery completely. It is known that
this situation is among the main safety hazards for electric & hybrid vehicles.
This study discusses the aspects that need to be considered and the right
methods to be applied in terms of effective and on-site emergency response
and rescue services specific to electric & hybrid vehicles in Türkiye.

Keywords: Emergency Response Methods in Electric & hybrid Vehicles,
Battery Fires in Electric & hybrid Vehicles, Rescue Services

Year 2 / Issue 3 / January 2023 199