USPS ban on international shipment of Li-ion batteries

[rkawakami]

As of today, May 16, 2012, the United States Postal Service has banned the shipment of rechargeable lithium-ion (Li-ion) batteries, as well as non-rechargeable lithium-based batteries, to APO, FPO, DPO and international destinations:

http://about.usps.com/postal-bulletin/2 ... dt_004.htm
http://www.pcmag.com/article2/0,2817,2404351,00.asp

This includes electronic equipment that contains said batteries, even if they are not removable. Items such as GPS, tablet computers, etc. are covered by the ban.

From the USPS notice, the ban may be lifted on January 1, 2013 but that is subject to discussions with the International Civil Aviation Organiza­tion (ICAO) and the Universal Postal Union (UPU).

edit 11/16/12:

As of 11/9/12, the USPS has reversed its decision to ban shipment of Li-Ion batteries. Thanks TuuS for pointing this out!

http://about.usps.com/news/national-rel ... 12_128.htm
http://pe.usps.com/Lithium_Battery_Update.asp

[TuuS]

I was reading about this and it's shocking and hard to believe... also, as another example of how government can totally confuse things, if you scroll down to the bottom of this bulletin the latest chart...

Exhibit 10.20.8 Lithium Battery Mailability Chart

Seems to suggest you CAN mail a single battery with the computer it operates.

I do agree that the beginning of this bulletin suggests the opposite and perhaps this chart represents the new proposed regulations, but it sure is unclear when they tell you that you can't do something, then provide a chart that says you can...

ps. admittedly I didn't read all the fine print... to be honest it was making my head pound and my eyes bleed trying to find a simple answer from paragraphs of confusion, so I just gave up. Typical government!!!

I guess international buyers will need to either source batteries locally, or use another carrier like ups or fedex, but they are generally much higher.

Very depressing news

[ajkula66]

The way I'm reading the USPS info, the table that TuuS posted applies to domestic shipments only...nice...

[RealBlackStuff]

One of their idiotic sentences:

The shipment must be contained in a strong enough sealed package to prevent crushing of the package or exposure of the contents during nor­mal handling in the mail.

This speaks volumes about the 'great care' USPS takes of your packages

[wkw1]

Yay. More shipping for UPS

I wonder what would happen if I mailed a button cell battery in an envelope

[dorronto]

Yay. More shipping for UPS

I wonder what would happen if I mailed a button cell battery in an envelope

I guess it would get caught in the DBCS sorting machine and hopefully not start a fire...a jam is one thing but USPS has enough problems to "sort" out..

I know.

Ron

[Raceboy]

Umm, this is outright stupid. But what about receiving a battery from abroad? Say I send it with national post and a buyer receives it with USPS?

What more could be done to fu*k up things even more?

[wkw1]

True, true. Now there are going to be terrorists making exploding ipads... No, just need a faulty ipad. Are they going to make the button cells in watched explode now?


I wonder, would it be a loophole if you put a li ion battery in a small box with a small circuit that turned on a light? It would be "part of the machine it functions in", then...

[JeffCullen]

Glad my W500 arrived a few days before this!

[mr.motoring]

Glad my W500 arrived a few days before this!

With a gigantic 9-cell too!

[JeffCullen]

Still loving it :D My fav laptop I've ever used.

[RoxyRose]

I am really confused. Does that mean you can't ship batteries with your laptops anymore outside US?

[ajkula66]

I am really confused. Does that mean you can't ship batteries with your laptops anymore outside US?

Exactly that.

[RoxyRose]

They already have one foot in the grave and then they do something like this? Terrible.

[pimpinainteasy]

Also note that for purposes of this battery ban, APO/FPO is "international," but US commonwealths and territories -- Puerto Rico, Guam, US Virgin Islands, Northern Mariana Islands -- are domestic, and not subject to the ban.

Sometimes people think that US territory/commonwealth addresses are the same as APO/FPO, but they're not. (Ah, the many Ebay sellers who see my address and thank me for serving in the military.)

[loyukfai]

Read somewhere that there had been fire incidents caused by lithium (ion?) batteries on flights, and I've seen a similar ban notice since perhaps the last or the year before in the local (Hong Kong) post office, as mandated by the international postal alliance, IIRC.

Whether people actually follow the rules and/or if it's strictly enforced, is another matter altogether.

Cheers.

[bwaldow]

Umm, this is outright stupid.

I will suggest that it is not.

Lithium batteries can and do catch on fire from being knocked hard. They are extremely difficult to put out once burning.

You do not want to be on an airplane with burning batteries several hours from any landing strip.

"Without new safety standards, lithium batteries that can spontaneously combust were projected to destroy one U.S.- registered cargo jet every other year, according to a study commissioned by U.S. and Canadian aviation regulators. Shipments of lithium batteries that include those used in mobile phones, tablets and laptop computers have been suspected of contributing to two U.S. cargo-jet accidents since 2006."

http://www.bloomberg.com/news/2012-02-1 ... -rule.html

Regards,
Bret

[dr_st]

I will suggest that it is not.

Lithium batteries can and do catch on fire from being knocked hard. They are extremely difficult to put out once burning.

You do not want to be on an airplane with burning batteries several hours from any landing strip.

Indeed.

Therefore I suggest an international ban on shipping any kind of Lithium batteries to Australia.

[wkw1]

Why not ship them on a boat?

[RealBlackStuff]

Why bother?
Get your batteries locally one way or another, we all (have to) do!

[TuuS]

It's my understanding that the battery has to be active to be a fire risk. A properly designed battery that's not installed in the product should be safe to ship.

However, there are a lot of blackmarket batteries coming out of asia. I was scammed into buying one on ebay where the seller had a photo of a genuine one, listed manufacturer as Lenovo, then shipped me one that the only english writing on it said "replace thinkpad"... which I suspect is instructions on what to do next after attempting to install such a battery lol

In addition, when these are shipped out of china, they are usually shipped with as little packing as possible to save on postal fees, and without the proper safty circuits I'm sure one of them could be a fire hazard, but a properly made battery isn't a risk.

By the way I've been planning a test. I have a battery that charged to 100% before the controller died and it's useless. I'm thinking about shooting it with a shotgun at close range. Anyone think there will be flames? I think it's possible but unlikely. I suspect it will shatter into thousands of pieces, but I doubt there will be any fire. Would definitely be a good one for youtube.

[goofyGAguy]

By the way I've been planning a test. I have a battery that charged to 100% before the controller died and it's useless. I'm thinking about shooting it with a shotgun at close range. Anyone think there will be flames? I think it's possible but unlikely. I suspect it will shatter into thousands of pieces, but I doubt there will be any fire. Would definitely be a good one for youtube.

That sounds like something we would do down here. It usually begins with "Hey y'all, watch this!"

[piscikeeper]

That sounds like something we would do down here. It usually begins with "Hey y'all, watch this!"

....and definitely ends up on YouTube.

[TuuS]

We could launch them into the air and if they explode, they will certainly be more fun then watching a clay disc shatter

[EM745]

It's my understanding that the battery has to be active to be a fire risk.

Yeah see, the thing is, Li-Ions are routinely used as backup power sources in commercial aircrafts' standby instruments (which are mostly all-glass nowadays). Example: L-3's "Trilogy," which has an internal Li-Ion batt.

Now I'm no engineer, but I'm assuming that these internal backup batteries are hard-wired and ready to go into action (i.e. they're "active") in case of a plane-wide power failure.

Umm, this is outright stupid.

Indeed, and given what I said above, amusingly ironic.

[TuuS]

I will suggest that it is not.

Lithium batteries can and do catch on fire from being knocked hard. They are extremely difficult to put out once burning.

You do not want to be on an airplane with burning batteries several hours from any landing strip.

"Without new safety standards, lithium batteries that can spontaneously combust were projected to destroy one U.S.- registered cargo jet every other year, according to a study commissioned by U.S. and Canadian aviation regulators. Shipments of lithium batteries that include those used in mobile phones, tablets and laptop computers have been suspected of contributing to two U.S. cargo-jet accidents since 2006."

http://www.bloomberg.com/news/2012-02-1 ... -rule.html

Regards,
Bret

Bret, after reading the article you linked, I couldn't help noticing the following about the two jets mentioned...


Jet #1: The investigation, which focused on batteries, was unable to determine the cause of the fire.

Jet #2: was carrying more than 81,000 lithium batteries

Is there one single spec of evidence that it's dangerous to ship a laptop or a single battery alone?

I think if they prohibit all the fake blackmarket batteries coming out of asia, we'll all be fine. These have gotten through the normal screenings because of sites like ebay where any person in china can ship them one at a time to the end user who is clueless about how to recognize genuine markings that the battery complies with safety standards.

[TuuS]

Lithium batteries can and do catch on fire from being knocked hard. They are extremely difficult to put out once burning.

You do not want to be on an airplane with burning batteries several hours from any landing strip.

I was thinking about this today and it seems to me that a fireproof box could easily be used to put the burning battery/laptop/package into then fill the box with Halon gas, or simply let the oxygen expire and it will go out. Nothing can burn without oxygen, at least not in a conventional definition of burning which brings up another question I've always wondered about... would a nuclear bomb explode in outer space with no oxygen? conventional explosives would be useless, but I'm guessing even if a nuke could be detonated without oxygen, it would be exceedingly difficult to do so without conventional explosives that do require oxygen.

ps. Perhaps if someone marketed a cheap oxygen-free battery mailer bag that was fire resistant?

[cadillacmike68]

This whole thing is over hyped, and it's the EU's fault! I can't even send an ipad (as if i had an ipad) back home through the military post office here, because of this.

Do you all know that R-134a - the replacement refrigerant for R-12 (commonly referred to as "freon") has been designated by the EU as an environment polluter (or something like that) and now the entire auto industry has to come up with a new refrigerant for cars? I'm not talking about R-12 which is not even being produced any more (except maybe china and vietnam), but R-134a which was supposedly an environmentally safe alternative to R-12.

And I still have an R-12 equipped car.

[Raceboy]

What's the problem with EU? I can easily send batteries and laptops inside EU, to Canada or anywhere in the world. Just not to US. And I cannot buy batteries from US.

[cadillacmike68]

What's the problem with EU? I can easily send batteries and laptops inside EU, to Canada or anywhere in the world. Just not to US. And I cannot buy batteries from US.

There's a bunch of jacka$$es in charge, that's the problem.