**1. Introduction**

### *1.1. Background*

In Austria and other European countries, like Germany, France or Sweden, the occurrences of waste fires has increased enormously in the last years [1–3]. The subsequent monetary and infrastructural losses have reached a new peak and they are threatening the whole waste industry sector [4].

Recent research showed that high amounts of portable batteries are improperly discarded in different municipal solid waste streams, such as residual household waste, lightweight packaging waste, or metal packaging waste [5]. While there is a plethora of different electrochemical systems, the average distribution is shifting more and more towards metal lithium and lithium-ion. That shift is accompanied by increased fire hazards and other safety challenges all along the value chain in the batteries' end-of-life.
