Emergency Management in an Electric Future: Guidelines to Increase Safety

As electric vehicles (EVs) become increasingly popular, several emergency management-related issues have arisen, such as EV hazard events during storage and charging and EV use in extreme weather. Because the goal for many states is to rapidly increase the adoption and use of EVs in personal and public operations, it is essential to manage these EV incidents to keep the public and emergency responders safe and maintain operation of the transportation system. This is a new area of emergency management that would benefit from research on the causes of and best practices for containing EV incidents. The objectives of this research are to identify the risks of EV incidents and to provide recommendations to mitigate the effects of these incidents. Key components of the research include: (1) Identifying plans and designs of storage, parking, and charging facilities than can reduce damage to infrastructure and injuries to workers and the public. (2) Providing guidance to emergency responders, especially state DOT responders, on securing scenes, handling battery fires, and moving damaged EVs safely. (3) Developing strategies to mitigate the impacts of EV incidents on the transportation system, such as longer closure times for firefighting and infrastructure damage from battery fires. (4) Identifying solutions for EV users during situations including extreme weather events, highway closures, battery failures on roadsides, and mass evacuation charging.

• Record URL:
  http://apps.trb.org/cmsfeed/TRBNetProjectDisplay.asp?ProjectID=5689
• Supplemental Notes:
  • Contract to a Performing Organization has not yet been awarded.

Language

• English

Project

• Status: Proposed
• Funding: $300000
• Contract Numbers:

  Project 20-132

• Sponsor Organizations:

  National Cooperative Highway Research Program

  Transportation Research Board
  500 Fifth Street, NW
  Washington, DC  United States  20001

  American Association of State Highway and Transportation Officials (AASHTO)

  444 North Capitol Street, NW
  Washington, DC  United States  20001

  Federal Highway Administration

  1200 New Jersey Avenue, SE
  Washington, DC  United States  20590
• Project Managers:

  Zelinski, Patrick

• Start Date: 20240523
• Expected Completion Date: 0
• Actual Completion Date: 0

Subject/Index Terms

• TRT Terms: Electric vehicle charging; Electric vehicles; Emergency management; Risk assessment; Vehicle safety
• Subject Areas: Energy; Highways; Safety and Human Factors; Vehicles and Equipment;

Filing Info

• Accession Number: 01919459
• Record Type: Research project
• Source Agency: Transportation Research Board
• Contract Numbers: Project 20-132
• Files: TRB, RIP
• Created Date: May 23 2024 10:09AM