Electric vehicles (EVs) are reportedly exploding from water damage following Hurricane Ian, a top Florida state official warns.
Jimmy Patronis, Florida’s top financial officer and fire marshal, said that EV batteries that have been waterlogged after the hurricane are at a high risk of corrosion, which could lead to unexpected fires.
It takes special training and understanding of EVs to ensure these fires are put out quickly and safely. Thanks to @NCFRPio for their hard work. #Hurricanelan pic.twitter.com/oN0RvQTG2U
— Jimmy Patronis (@JimmyPatronis) October 6, 2022
“There’s a ton of EVs disabled from Ian. As those batteries corrode, fires start,” Patronis tweeted on Thursday. “That’s a new challenge that our firefighters haven’t faced before. At least on this kind of scale.”
Patronis posted a video of firefighters in Naples battling a fire started by a Tesla EV. A bystander is overheard in the video saying that the crew had already used hundreds of gallons of water to put the fire out.
“It takes special training and understanding of EVs to ensure these fires are put out quickly and safely,” he continued in a follow-up tweet. “Thanks to [North Collier Fire Rescue] for their hard work.”
It is unclear how many EV batteries were impacted or destroyed by the storm.
Meanwhile, Democrats have been pushing for the use of EVs as the Biden administration moves forward with its green agenda involving zero-emission cars. Between April and June, EVs accounted for 5.6% of new car purchases in the U.S., a slight increase from the first three months of 2022, according to Kelley Blue Book.
In California, for instance, lawmakers have moved to require all new vehicles in the state to run on electricity by 2035 in the hopes of cutting emissions from cars in half by 2040. The California Air Resources Board has also proposed requiring medium and heavy-duty trucks to be fully electric by the year 2035.
Shortly after taking office, President Joe Biden announced a goal of ensuring that 50% of new car sales would be EVs by 2030.
However, critics have blasted Biden for giving a “false impression” about EVs, noting that they are expensive and often unreliable.
“[The EV push] is really kind of a con job,” said Myron Ebell, the director of the Competitive Enterprise Institute’s Center for Energy and Environment. “It may be a good deal for some people in some places under some circumstances. But by-and-large right now, it’s not a good deal.”
