The South Korean government said it planned to bring forward its electric vehicle (EV) battery certification programme to alleviate growing safety concerns following a series of “spontaneous” fires.
A major fire last month in an Incheon apartment complex started in a parked Mercedes-Benz EQE fitted with batteries produced by China’s Farasis Energy, reportedly took eight hours to extinguish and destroyed around 140 vehicles.
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In a separate incident in the same month a Kia EV6 powered by batteries supplied by South Korea’s SK On Company also caught fire in a parking lot.
The rising number of such incidents has dampened already weak consumer confidence in the battery electric vehicle (BEV) segment with sales down sharply in the first half of the year. Last year, 70 electric vehicle fires were reported across the country.
The government announced at the weekend it would bring forward its BEV battery certification programme to October to help ensure BEVs meet its minimum safety requirements.
The government would also require automakers to disclose the batteries used in all their EVs, following an earlier move urging automakers to provide this information voluntarily.
