Long touted as the go-to solution for most of today’s advanced modern technology looking for longer-lasting charges, the lithium-ion battery has certainly not been without its challenges. In the past decade, there have been increasingly more incidences of electronics catching on fire or melting with many across industries pointing their finger to lithium-ion batteries as the culprit.
The latest in these seemingly endless series of lithium-ion battery malfunctions comes to us from a major online retailer which recently announced a recall of multiple power banks.
While this company isn’t exactly the first to deal with this issue, it seems as though it won’t be the last.
From Samsung’s Galaxy Note 7 exploding to kids’ hoverboards catching fire and a woman’s headphones burning up on a Delta Airlines flight, device malfunctions are becoming harder to ignore and seemingly a regular occurrence.
Should consumers be worried?
While consumers should likely be worried, it’s companies that need to turn up the volume when it comes to these types of dangerous issues. As more people continue to use multiple devices throughout the day for work, play and just in general to stay connected, it seems as though it’s unavoidable for today’s society to go without their mobile electronics.
With all of these devices, the lithium-ion battery industry is doing quite well. In fact, while Frost & Sullivan’s research already demonstrated its growth from $11.7 billion in 2012 to $22.5 billion in 2016, the analyst firm projects the lithium-ion industry to continue its upward trajectory reaching $67.7 billion by the year 2022.
What is being done to make lithium-ion safer for consumer devices?
As companies are either recalling potentially dangerous lithium-ion batteries before they malfunction, and sometimes after, HP took it a step further. Earlier this year, it not only recalled over 50,000 lithium-ion laptop batteries, it offered up a software update to help put the computers in a Battery Safe Mode to discharge the battery until it could be replaced.
While recalls and software updates seem to be the current solution for some companies today, we’re looking into the future with how we protect our devices at Omnicharge.
Inside our charger units, Omnicharge puts its Patented Power Protection System in place to ensure safety at all times. Whether it’s temperature monitoring or fuse-design protection, we’ve put all the necessary components into this system.
From engineering to the final product stage, we work to make safety our number one priority especially when it comes to high-power capacity charging devices. As a power solutions company, here are just a few ways we at Omnicharge keep both consumers and businesses safe:
Comprehensive Multi-Temperature Sensors: Integrated with three temperature sensors (PCBA / Battery / MCU) to monitor the real-time temperature of each part. An automatic system protection goes into effect in case of abnormally high or low temperatures.
Self-Balancing Algorithm: Charging program constantly monitors and adjusts individual battery cells, performance and capacity level and maximizes battery cell’s efficiency.
Short Circuit Protection: Built-in fuse design protects the device from short circuiting.
Automatic Power-off: When running current in the battery exceeds its standard safety limit, an automatic power-off system takes over to prevent overheating.
Reset Program Algorithm: Automatic restart commences when the charger CPU detects abnormal system parameters.
Overcharge Protection: Prevents overcharging of batteries by automatically disconnecting from power source.
Determining safety levels in any mobile device is a tough issue for most any consumer. We believe it’s the job of the device manufacturer to ensure optimal safety standards and protection systems are in place at the onset since we all carry around multiple devices on a daily basis.
For more information on our Patented Power Protection System, please click here.