Industrial lithium ion battery safety - What are the tradeoffs?

The issue of lithium ion battery safety has become very prominent of late, but with much larger lithium-based batteries being seriously considered or actively deployed by many telecom network operators, safety has been elevated to a new level. This paper discusses the abuse tolerance of industrial lithium ion batteries for telecom network applications and some of the international standards to which these batteries are being qualified. The drivers that cause operators to consider lithium ion batteries may also limit some avenues for improvement in abuse tolerance. It is important for such a battery not just to be safe in both normal and abusive conditions, but also to have a long life, high energy density, good electrical performance and high availability. The paper examines these features and describes the potential tradeoffs.