A federal bill the FDNY contends would help douse the dangerous trend of e-bike battery fires that has killed 31 New Yorkers in four years has been stalled in the Senate since July. The roadblock: Texas Sen. Ted Cruz and his rage against what he sees as the Biden Administration’s campaign to ban gas stoves.
The bill would require the Consumer Product Safety Commission (CPSC) to draft mandatory safety standards for all lithium-ion batteries and related chargers that power micro mobility devices such as e-bikes and e-scooters.
The House version, sponsored by Rep. Ritchie Torres (D-The Bronx), passed in May with solid bipartisan support. The Senate version also has bipartisan backers, including Senate Majority Leader Chuck Schumer and Sen. Kirsten Gillibrand, both New York Democrats, as well as Sen. Marsha Blackburn (R-Tennessee) and Sen. Mike Braun (R-Indiana). New York City fire officials expected swift passage in the upper chamber.
But in July, Cruz, the ranking minority member of the Commerce Committee where the bill was pending, sent the Senate version into limbo, adding an amendment that the bill’s sponsors said would gut the consumer agency’s ability to regulate the safety of the potentially volatile batteries.
Cruz’s focus was not on dangerous batteries but instead targeted the CPSC — the same agency that last year proposed regulations that would reduce gas consumption in stoves to help trim carbon emissions. Some Republicans, including Cruz, labeled the proposal an “anti gas stove” initiative initiated by an out-of-control agency that was exceeding its jurisdiction.
Meanwhile, three New Yorkers have died in fires caused by exploding lithium-ion batteries just since the House passed its version of the safety bill on May 15, starting with the May 23 death of journalist Fazil Khan in a Harlem fire triggered by batteries charging in an apartment below his. A second battery-triggered fatality occurred under similar circumstances on Avenue M in Brooklyn and a third on Throop Avenue in The Bronx.
“It’s unfortunate that this bill is being held up due to an unrelated issue,” Gillibrand told THE CITY. “In states across the country, fires caused by faulty lithium-ion batteries have injured or killed hundreds of people and torn apart families. There’s a reason firefighter unions are behind it — it’s a commonsense and bipartisan policy that will save lives.”
The FDNY began noticing this new danger in 2019 as the reliance on e-bikes by food delivery workers began to increase and saw the numbers jump dramatically during the pandemic. Since then, there have been 910 fires caused by batteries resulting in 509 injuries and 31 deaths through Sept. 2, according to the department’s statistics.
The safety bill is meant to address the flood of poorly made batteries that are not safety certified by labs such as UL Solutions but are in common use in New York City. These untested batteries are prone to explosion if they’re not charged properly and, as THE CITY has reported, the fires they trigger have occurred more often than not in locations where people live.
The House and Senate battery safety bills have both received support from a wide variety of stakeholders, including the International Association of Fire Chiefs, the National Volunteer Fire Council, the United States Conference of Mayors, Consumer Reports and Grubhub and DoorDash.
The House bill requires that within a year, the CPSC must develop safety standards which battery makers would be required to adopt. Currently the standards are only voluntary.
The problem for Cruz, who is up for re-election this year, emerged in the language of the House bill, which would give the CPSC authority to modify these standards “at any time” going forward. Its supporters say this is crucial given the fact that the technology behind these batteries is constantly changing and being upgraded.
“The modification clause affords the CPSC the authority and flexibility it needs to respond rapidly to the changing facts on the ground about the role of poorly made lithium-ion batteries in causing fires,” Torres told THE CITY. “There should be nothing controversial about fire prevention, which should be bipartisan and bicameral.”
‘Rogue Agency’
Cruz opposed the modification language in a bout of fury at the CPSC following its proposed regulations requiring stove manufacturers to reduce the gas consumption of their products. The proposal triggered a wave of exaggerated Republican outrage that claimed the administration of President Joe Biden was coming to take away consumers’ gas stoves.
For the last two years Cruz has gone after the CPSC, castigating “drunk-on-power bureaucrats” who were exceeding the authority the agency was granted by Congress. In response to the GOP backlash, the agency in January altered the proposed energy consumption standards for new stoves, offering a rule that would prohibit about 3% of stoves currently on the market, far below the original rule that would have affected 50% of stoves.
Nevertheless, Cruz has continued his crusade to restrict the agency’s ability to regulate, a position that emerged front and center during a discussion on the lithium-ion battery safety bill at a Commerce, Science and Transportation Committee session held July 31.
“Lately, unfortunately, the CPSC has been operating outside its authority, particularly with its ridiculous effort to try to ban gas stoves,” Cruz said. “This is unacceptable and Congress should not reward this conduct by giving more authority to this rogue agency.”
Cruz then offered an amendment requiring the CPSC to craft a standard based on the current voluntary rule and prevent it from updating or changing the rule going forward unless safety labs changed their standards first.
He called his amendment a “compromise to address the fires while putting guardrails around the CPSC.” This, he argued, would show “Congress is speaking to the fire risk without giving the agency broad authority that can be abused.”
The chair of the committee, Sen. Maria Cantwell (D-Washington), immediately slapped back at Cruz’s argument, stating that “the purpose of this amendment is really to limit the CPSC’s ability by requiring the agency to adopt voluntary standards.”
“We should not let the fear-mongering about this agency now hobble them from doing their true mission, which is protecting our safety, protecting consumers and protecting our first responders,” she said. “The House passed legislation that is endorsed by firefighters, fire chiefs, building owners and Consumer Reports. I oppose the amendment.”
The committee then rejected Cruz’s amendment along party lines, voting 14-12 against it (committee member and GOP vice presidential nominee Sen. J.D. Vance of Ohio was absent and did not vote). The committee then passed the Senate version of the bill as written.
That version does not contain language giving the agency support for tracking and updating the standard. As a result, the bill remains passed by the committee but with no plans to bring it to the Senate floor for a vote until the language issue is cleaned up.
Since July 31, both the House and Senate sponsors of the bill have tried to get Cruz to sign off on an updated version. A month has passed with no response, and so the bill remains in limbo.
Cruz did not respond to THE CITY’s request for comment on Wednesday.
Gillibrand and Schumer did not respond to THE CITY’s requests for comment.
Meanwhile, battery fires continue in New York City. During a press conference last week, Chief Fire Marshal Daniel Flynn described two incidents: a battery blowing up at an e-bike store in Hollis, Queens, and a battery tossed into a trash barge anchored in Newtown Creek erupting into flames.
Flynn noted that “it takes a lot of resources to track this and a lot of jurisdictions do not have that,” describing the urgency of spreading the word about the potential danger of uncertified, unsafe batteries and the need to “get to the fire services throughout the country because it’s coming to them.”
“Everybody in fire services is of the same mindset,” he added. “We are all eager to learn and make everyone safer.”
