150 Chapter 12 6200 Watt-hours, the battery assembly does not need to be tested if it is equipped with a system capable of monitoring the battery assembly and preventing short circuits, or over discharge between the batteries in the assembly and any overheat or overcharge of the battery assembly. (United Nations, 2009, p. 397) Underwriter’s Laboratory Underwriter’s Laboratory (UL) has also been very active in the certification arena for lithium-ion battery testing. Most of the UL certification work and standards to date have been focused on nonautomotive applications, specifically focused on products in the mobile power, household, industrial, and commercial applications.
While UL has made strides in coordinating with the International Electrotechnical Commission (IEC), the automotive OEMs have pushed back on UL certification for automotive applications. As the OEMs already require and conduct a significant amount of testing and work with organizations such as the Society for Automotive Engineers (SAE) to develop standards around battery design and testing, they have been unwilling to add another level of certifi- cation that already mimics their own but would add a new layer of cost to the already expensive battery.
To date, UL continues to participate with SAE, IEC, and other automotive industry groups but their main certification standards today are focused on portable and household power applications. However, UL has developed and issued standard 2580 “Batteries for Use in Electric Vehicles” (Underwriter’s Laboratory, 2014) which offers a set of certification standards around the batteries ability to withstand simulated abuse conditions. The testing requirements of this standard mimic some of those required by the automotive manufactur- ers as well as the UN test manual, including a series of electrical tests, mechanical tests, and environmental tests.
So the UL testing goes over and above what is required for UN transport, but has not yet been widely accepted by the major automotive OEMs as a design requirement. The major UL certification requirements for lithium-ion batteries that exist today are:
UL 1642 Lithium Cell UL 1973 Batteries for use in Light Electric Rail applications and Stationary Applications UL 1989 Standby Batteries UL 2054 Alkaline Cell or Lithium/Alkaline Packs UL 2271 Batteries for use in Light Electric Vehicle applications UL 2580 Batteries for use in Electric Vehicles UL/CSA/IEC 60950 (may be evaluated in conjunction with UL 2054) UL/CSA/IEC 60065 Batteries used in Audio and Video Equipment (Underwriter’s Laboratory, 2014).