Charge your e-car at home without risk of fire
Created: 06/15/2022, 11:59 am
Safely plugged in: Before installing a wallbox, the building services should be checked.
© Florian Schuh/dpa-tmn/dpa
Do e-cars burn more often than combustion engines?
There is no evidence for this.
But outdated electrics for charging in your own garage can be a fire hazard.
The wall box is a must.
When
electric vehicles
burst into flames, the damage is often immense.
The attention too.
Fire protection researchers see no reason for particular concern.
However, a few prerequisites are important in order to be able to charge safely at home.
Sequentially.
"From our statistics, we have no indication that electric vehicles catch fire more often than cars with combustion engines," says Jörg Asmussen, General Manager of the German Insurance Association (GDV).
This coincides with observations by the police and fire brigade - but not necessarily with the gut feeling of many.
According to a survey by the market research institute YouGov on behalf of DEVK-Versicherungen, 49 percent of those surveyed believe that electric vehicles catch fire faster than vehicles with combustion engines.
Older people in particular estimate the fire risk of electric cars to be higher.
No official statistics on e-car fires
There are no official statistics on e-car fires.
However, the Baden-Württemberg Ministry of the Interior points to the steady increase in vehicles with alternative drive systems.
"As a result, the number of electrically powered vehicles involved in accidents and fires is also increasing per se."
Car manufacturers refer to the
multi-level safety system of battery-powered cars
.
This should rule out overheating and overcharging in every operating state.
According to the experience of the expert organization Dekra, there are risks when charging that do not exist with conventionally powered vehicles.
At the same time, there are no combustion-specific causes of fire in purely electric vehicles.
"So there is a shift in risk without, from our point of view, increasing the overall risk," says a Dekra spokesman.
Fires involving e-cars are still rather rare.
Frank Hachemer, Vice-President of the German Fire Brigade Association (DFV), expects more e-cars to cause more fires in e-vehicles.
This is a challenge for the fire brigade: Such fires have to be extinguished with a large amount of water so that the cooling effect can take effect.
You can adapt to that, says Hachemer.
Charge at the normal socket - better not regularly
Battery defects can lead to overheating or overcharging, and broken emergency charging cables can also be a fire hazard.
Dekra and ADAC also point out the risk of smoldering and cable fires caused by outdated or overloaded electrical installations in the house.
For safety reasons, the car club advises against regular charging at household sockets.
According to Dekra, it becomes even more problematic if the vehicle is charged in community garages using an emergency charging cable at existing Schuko sockets.
For safety reasons, charging at a standard household Schuko socket should be restricted to exceptional cases, according to the ADAC.
The sockets are designed for domestic use and similar applications.
When charging e-vehicles for several hours, increased resistance in the circuit can occur due to aging processes in the contacts, at terminal points in the supply line or due to improper installation.
This can lead to excessive heating and thus to the risk of fire.
The experts recommend a permanently installed charging station – the so-called wall box.
The ADAC tested 12 models at the end of February.
The price range of the devices in the test ranged from 675 to 1570 euros.
In addition, there are always individual costs for the installation.
But here, too, the upstream network installation must fit.
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What is to be considered?
The Central Association of German Electrical and Information Technology Trades (ZVEH) strongly recommends a check of the electrical system by a specialist electrical company.
"Charging vehicles is safe if the standards are observed," says Andreas Habermehl, technical director of the association.
Without checking, an overload might initially go undetected.
It is even more dangerous if a layman lends a hand.
A
charging station
is a major intervention in the electrical system.
"You can't compare that to connecting a washing machine or an electric stove."
dpa/ahu
