I wonder if in 50 years we’ll look at the current generation lithium ion batteries and think “how did people ever think those were safe?”

Don’t get me wrong, I think we’ve done a great job making them safe, safer than other tech like combustion engines and you don’t have the long term risks like nuclear or PFAS. But fundamentally they are a bad chemical reaction waiting to happen. Which is ok in a few devices. But now that every consumer product under the sun has an internal battery, our (small) risk has increased like 200x.

I hope we have some battery tech breakthroughs in the near future. Until then, we probably should avoid buying no-name devices with a battery, properly dispose of old electronic devices, and not put battery powered devices in our checked luggage.