Electric vehicles are being promoted by the central government. For this, auto companies are given subsidy on concessional electric vehicles. On the one hand, efforts are underway to procure e-vehicles, while on the other hand, the incidence of e-scooter fires has increased in the last few days. Concerns were being raised about these incidents. The DRDO was then directed by the central government to investigate the cause of the fire. DRDO has submitted its report to the government. Since then, the government has issued summons to several companies, including Ola Electric.
Why did the e-scooter catch fire?
DRDO's Center for Fire, Explosive and Environmental Safety (CFEES) unit was tasked with investigating the e-scooter fire. Sources told Business Today. The report of the fire investigation has been handed over to the government. According to some reports, a sudden fire on an electric scooter is being linked to battery issues.
The DRDO said in its report that scooter were catching fire as the batteries in the e-scooters were of inferior quality. In addition, it is said that the battery has not been adequately tested at different temperatures. It was suspected that low quality materials were being used to reduce the cost of manufacturing e-scooters. DRDO recommends tightening rules for electric vehicle companies.
Electric scooters currently account for 2% of the market. Over the next eight years, electric scooters and bikes are targeted to account for 80 percent of the two-wheeler market by 2030. Nine electric scooters have caught fire since last year.
A few electric vehicle makers including Pure EV, Boom Motors, Ola Electric Jitendra EV, and Okinawa Autotech recalled the faulty batches after the fire incidents. The findings identified issues with the battery cells or the design of the battery in all the cases.