February 3, 2026 PACT Turns Paper into Powerful Fire-Protection Material

Lithium batteries offer convenience but cause destruction and death every year. A US manufacturer is preventing them with a paper innovation.

By Rodger Mort, chief operating officer at Packaging And Crating Technologies (PACT®)

We certainly live in an electronic age!  From electric vehicles and E-bikes to cell phones and tablets, new E-mobility equipment and handheld devices are continually entering our modern society to make our lives more efficient.  Regardless of their size and function, they all have one thing in common: they are powered by lithium-ion batteries, which do offer positive rechargeable benefits, but simultaneously carry dangerous hazards.  Every day around the world, there is death and destruction because a lithium battery was not charged, stored or recycled properly. 

In fact, according to the U.S. Consumer Product Safety Commission, while the total nationwide data for 2025 has not yet been finalized, reports indicate a continuing upward trend from 2024, with over 1.3 million negative incidents linked to lithium battery fires.  Leaving any lithium battery to charge unattended is a major safety hazard, but can become a crime scene especially in large, populated cities like New York, Los Angeles and Chicago where entire blocks have burnt down and many human lives have been lost, often firefighters, police officers, EMS technicians and other first responders.

That’s why we, at Packaging And Crating Technologies (PACT®), a global manufacturer of durable, recyclable corrugated cardboard containers for the commercial, industrial and military industries, felt it was our duty to help mitigate explosive fires and emission of noxious gases caused by lithium batteries by creating a solution.  In 2019, we developed a patented, fire-suppressant packaging wrap called Thermo Shield^TM, a thin paper material designed to control thermal runaway, a phenomenon in which a lithium-ion cell enters a volatile and uncontrollable, self-heating state caused by extremely high temperatures, banging or puncturing during transit, or internal defect, which can easily combust. Not only do lithium-ion battery blazes generate intense heat as they burn for hours, sometimes days, but they can also eject shrapnel, smoke and hydrogen fluoride gas, a toxic threat to people and the atmosphere. 

We manufacture Thermo Shield by using 50lb of virgin Kraft bag stock, which it printed on a flexographic preprint press in Georgia. Two coats of our special ink are applied to one side of the paper. The resulting roll-stock is then shipped to our Watertown, CT plant. Special liners are applied to the top and bottom of the material with sprayed glue every 6”. This three-layer reel of 250 lineal feet has now been converted into Thermo Shield. PACT also offers a 40lb recycled line print option that is run through a pleating machine and folded into creases.

When PACT Thermo Shield reaches a temperature of 200 °F, it undergoes a chemical reaction that absorbs the heat and releases moisture. Simply stated, the paper creates a non-toxic vapor cloud that immediately cools the internal environment of the package, while limiting oxygen around the payload.  This process allows the individual battery cell to burn out on its own, prevent thermal runaway from spreading to other areas of the container, suppress a potentially deadly fire explosion, and shield the surrounding environment from a flammable mixture of lethal gases.

Thermo Shield contains temperatures up to 1,800 °F, while restricting the temperature outside of the wrap to 140 °F.  This makes our product’s ability to contain both the fire and residual smoke within the protective wrap even more critical.

Taking this technology one step further, PACT recently designed a special product just for E-mobility equipment – the TR Sleeve^TM, which effectively stops thermal runaway propagation between lithium-battery cells within electric vehicles, electric bikes, battery packs and renewable energy storage systems, capable of containing thermal events that again heat up to 1,800 F.  Here, we take the same 50lb virgin Kraft bag stock and apply four total coats of our proprietary ink: two coats on one side of the paper and two coats on the opposite side. After the printing process, the roll-stock is slit into the proper width. The TR Sleeve rolls are then sent to customers to glue a layer around the diameter of each battery cell, ultimately assembled into a battery pack. Should thermal runaway occur, the rogue cell will burn out quickly, preventing all other cells from also entering a thermal runaway state, while retaining 100% of the battery charge. 

TR Sleeve is a highly versatile material that works on all cell designs and batteries can be tightly pressed or stacked without potting materials or separators, achieving maximum energy density within the battery packs. Further, TR Sleeve mitigates thermal energy release, protecting both human lives and the environment. Two independent 3^rd party organizations tested TR Sleeve multiple times and concluded that TR sleeve prevented thermal runaway propagation amongst cells.

For smaller handheld devices like cell phones, pagers, Bluetooth headsets, laptops, tablets and smartwatches, PACT has developed a smaller fire-retardant bag called the TR Envelope^TM to safely transport and recycle these items, which has become a major danger to the airline industry recently.  TR Envelope also provides an eco-friendly way to ship or transport products safely to a battery recycler.

Since its introduction to market six short years ago, the Thermo Shield line has been in demand by logistic and transportation companies, military and government departments and waste removal companies across America, Europe and Asia, seeking safe and affordable solutions.

As a powerful example of our technology in action, one of our clients is an e-scrap removal company that reduces the amount of unwanted electronic equipment in landfills.  A key facet of electronics recycling is handling batteries, whose dangerous chemicals necessitate special care.  Further, the company is required to dispose of damaged, defective or recalled batteries.  Originally using vermiculite, a sand-based insulator to recycle these dangerous items, the company executives discovered that Thermo Shield^TM would allow them to safely pack and fit more batteries in a single shipment, thus reducing shipping costs.  More importantly, our fire-suppressant packaging mitigated dangerous thermal runaway events, even for batteries charged at high levels.  This is a critical differentiator as battery recyclers rarely have a solid understanding of the charge levels of the batteries that they handle.  Of course, the higher the charge, the more dangerous the thermal runway event. Since incorporating Thermo Shield into its battery recycling process, the company has experienced significantly improved efficiency and zero runaway events, resulting in a smoother operation and peace of mind within its employees.

Beyond our life-saving lithium battery solutions, our company’s qualifications speak for themselves. PACT is a member of the Commercial Relocation Network, the Council on Safe Transportation of Hazardous Materials and the International Association of Movers.  Our company is also a preferred vendor for the US Department of Defense, and Thermo Shield has been awarded a special permit from the US Department of Transportation for shipping lithium-ion batteries, as well as passed the proposed SAE International 27 test standard, a global association of more than 128,000 engineers and related technical experts in the aerospace, automotive and commercial vehicle industries.

In conclusion, as the number of electronic equipment and devices continues to increase in society, so does the threat of deadly lithium-ion battery blazes, which power them. PACT remains committed to creating innovative solutions that save both human lives and the environment.

About the Author:
Rodger Mort is Chief Operating Officer at Packaging And Crating Technologies (PACT), a global manufacturer of sustainable, corrugated cardboard packaging containers for the commercial, industrial, and military industries.  Mort brings over 40 years of green packaging experience to the industry with a specialty of designing paper-based packaging material that suppresses and controls lithium-ion battery fires by mitigating thermal runaway. For more information, visit www.pactthermoshield.com or LinkedIn: @packaging-and-crating-technologies.

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