Teijin brings a flame-retardant innovation to EV batteries

The frenzy to produce and sell more electric vehicles is haunted by the image of an EV battery on fire. But engineers at Teijin Auto-motive, the Detroit supplier of materials, battery enclosures and pickup boxes, have managed to produce an advanced flame-retardant material that should ease consumer and automaker worries about such fires. Called phenolic, the material is better known in the aerospace industry, but Teijin has redeveloped it for use in autos. That task included altering its chemical composition and rendering the material odor-neutral. The company plans to quickly get phenolic into prod-uction globally to create battery enclosures that do not go up in flames.