Quoting carbon monoxide as of it were a unique product of a battery fire immediately casts doubt as to any of this being a legitimate concern. Getting something so wrong ruins the credabity of the rest of the piece. (every fire involving carbon produces some CO especially when oxygen is limited and combustion becomes less and less complete)
It's an article by a tort lawyer who is commenting on the lack of training. It is not a engineering analysis -- in context, it is clear that those chemicals were simply listed as examples.
"Unique Dangers Associated with Electric Battery Fires
First, during an electric vehicle fire, over 100 organic chemicals are generated, including toxic gases like carbon monoxide and hydrogen cyanide, both of which are fatal to humans."
It's propaganda. "primarily to influence an audience and further an agenda" You aren't getting any facts in there that don't further the authors claims, and the ones that are there are written in a dishonest way.
If the author said that "during an electric vehicle fire, over 100 organic chemicals are generated as opposed a conventional vehicle fire where 10/100/1000 different organic chemicals are generated" at least you'd have a basis of comparison, as it is, it just written to sound scary without informing you in any way what so ever.
Of course. I am under no impression that tort lawyers are either experts in, or interested in, chemical engineering or firefighting practices.
Their expertise is in illustrating culpability for civil wrongs.
The author is simply establishing that the situation is dangerous and has inherent differences that would necessitate different training. The actual differences in combustion byproducts are 100% irrelevant to the main point.
The author isn't highlighting the dangers of a conventional fire not because they are not dangerous, but because they are universally trained for.
Carbon monoxide is presented as an example of a "Unique danger[s] associated with electric battery fires." Why should he get a pass for being a lawyer? That makes his ignorance more concerning, not less.
The article does not say that CO is unique to battery fires, nor does it present a comparison of combustion byproducts. The authors occupation is relevant because it can help you determine the perspective from which the article is written. A tort lawyer is interested in the culpability for a wrong. And in the case of someone being injured by chemicals, they'd want to establish that the substance was harmful. Certainly, if the byproduct of battery fires was bubblegum and gumdrops, training might not be as important. The point of the sentence you're referring to is to establish that this is not the case, and therefore, the situation merits training.
