Chinese PV inverter and storage heavyweight Sungrow has announced that its PowerTitan 3.0 battery energy storage system (BESS) in a 20ft configuration successfully completed a large-scale fire test (LSFT) held in China, conducted by UL Solutions.
Sungrow said the LSFT was conducted “in accordance with the latest applicable requirements of UL 9540A: 2026 and CSA/ANSI C800-2025.”
The UL Solutions test was said to be witnessed by the Fire Risk Alliance (FRA) and observed by the organization Jensen Hughes. The test focused on intentionally initiating a severe thermal runaway event with disabled fire suppression systems and monitoring whether it spread from a burning BESS container to adjacent BESS containers and other equipment, such as medium-voltage substations (MVS).
The testing facilities contain ultra-large ventilation and hoods above fires, treating all smoke and gases, meaning no untreated smoke is released into the environment.
PowerTitan 3 LSFT test setup
Sungrow said the test setup replicated the block-level layout of a real-world utility-scale BESS installation, which included 28.56 MWh of fully liquid-cooled PowerTitan 3.0 BESS in its 20ft configuration, and a 7.4 MW medium-voltage substation (MVS). The release identifies Containers A–E but does not specify which housed the MVS. The BESS was at 100% state of charge, and the initiating container and an adjacent container were installed back-to-back.
All active fire suppression systems and thermal management systems were disabled, and rooftop pressure-relief panels of the initiating container were also fully opened to maximize ventilation and oxygen availability.
PowerTitan 3 LSFT results
Sungrow said the test successfully demonstrated “that thermal runaway did not propagate from the initiating BESS container to any adjacent containers or the MVS.”
According to the provided details, the test ran for 7.5 hours under uninterrupted monitoring. The peak internal temperature in the initiating container, Container A, reached 1259.8°C, while the highest cell temperature in the adjacent containers remained below their thermal runaway threshold, according to Sungrow, though the temperature was not specified.
Container A remained structurally intact, and adjacent Containers B, C, D, and E also remained structurally intact, with no deformation. Even after the fire test, the container remained structurally intact and could be lifted as a complete unit.
What they said:
Roger Li, general manager of the utility-scale product line, Sungrow energy storage business unit: “This test was about verifying our safety design under real-world extreme conditions. Safety must be engineered into the product from the beginning. Simulation helps predict how the system will respond, while large-scale fire testing puts those predictions to the test. Energy storage safety is about far more than cell safety alone. It is the result of multiple factors working together, including cell performance, system integration, thermal management, structural protection, engineering design and more.”
Benjamin Liu, engineering manager at UL Solutions, commented: “Sungrow started with safety by design, used pre-test assessments to predict fire behavior, and then validated those predictions through a large-scale fire test. The test result showed that the design was able to contain the fire and prevent propagation, helping significantly reduce the potential scale of loss.”
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