Lithium ion batteries have become the leading cause of fires at scrap and waste facilities, with scrap yards being heavily impacted due to the high volume processing of mixed metals where batteries hide. This is now being considered a recurring operational challenge in yards, driving higher insurance premiums, equipment damage, and lost production time.
These batteries often enter via light iron piles, auto bodies, appliances, or mixed scrap, and ignite during handling, shredding, or compacting. Until recently, there was no easy detection method for batteries, as they can be small, often non magnetic, and not visually obvious in piles.
That challenge in identification is the same problem that fire fighters and yard staff have to face when trying to extinguish a battery fire. Because these batteries can have self sustaining internal chain reactions that continue to generate intense heat and gases, after a fire is put out, the batteries must be found and isolated. Otherwise, the fires can last days.
In the US and Canda, 2025 lithium ion battery caused fires at recycling facilities and material recover facilities are up 26 percent from the previous years’ average. And in Europe, the European Recycling Industries' Confederation (EuRIC) states that these fires caused by lithium batteries now pose an "existential risk" to companies processing electronic waste or metal scrap, with the average cost of damage caused by thermal events such as severe explosions and fires in facilities amounting to €1.3 million ($1.49 million) per incident. This is causing some insurance companies to withdraw from offering coverage to these businesses.
On February 21, 2025, a fire at Eastern Metal Recycling (EMR), a large scrap recycling facility in Camden, New Jersey, burned for 6-8 hours, producing a thick smoke visible for miles. A firefighter and two residents were hospitalized, over 100 families voluntarily evacuated, and the event caused health concerns for the residents. EMR admitted the culprit was a lithium battery “wrongly delivered” to the facility and was undetectably concealed within the scrap metal. It came in with scrap loads and evaded initial screening and inspections.
Not restricted to land, recently a scrap metal barge caught fire on the Delaware River near New Castle (Delaware), south of Philadelphia in the US. The barge, loaded with scrap, reportedly burned for many hours while several fireboats responded.
In the same area, another barge caught fire in 2022, this time rendering the barge useless after the fire burned for approximately 26 hours. The National Transportation Safety Board (NTSB) estimated the damage at $7 million dollars in their report and cited lithium ion batteries as the probable ignition sources.
With the increasing number of lithium ion battery fires, the traditional methods of detection are no longer adequate. Manual visual inspection, magnetic separation, air separation, Eddy current separators, and manual disassembly are clearly not enough.
Now, Artificial Intelligence (AI) is at the center of all the new methods being employed to proactively prevent fires. Thermal imaging and AI monitoring systems use thermal cameras to detect pre-incipient heat buildup before visible smoke or flames. AI vision systems use high speed cameras to identify battery shapes and colors to spot loose or protruding lithium ion cells in real time. X-Ray based AI sorting systems scan and penetrate dense materials and analyze the internal structure to classify battery chemistry and detect damaged cells.
Additionally, to protect these facilities, which play a critical role in a circular economy, it is essential to establish a joint action plan among public authorities, battery manufacturers, and the recycling industry. In Europe, in 2025, a coalition of waste recycling associations urged the European Commission to take regulatory action furthering the Extended Producer Responsibility (EPR) to cover fire prevention costs via a Battery Fire Prevention and Recovery Fund and implementing a Deposit Return Systems for batteries.
Meanwhile in North America, there were multiple campaigns to educate the public and properly dispose of batteries, such as “Skip the Bin – Turn Your batteries In!” and “Take Charge: Be Battery Smart”.
With more training of staff at recycling facilities to stop fires being carried out, educating the public, implementing guidelines for handling the batteries at end of life, and making AI-supported smart sorting systems and thermal detection networks standard equipment in facilities will be the most effective line of defense in preventing these devastating fires.
.jpg)