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From January 1, 2008, there’s one more thing to consider when packing your bags before a flight. The Department of Transport issued a directive, effective from the New Year, that loose lithium batteries will not be allowed in your checked baggage. Since lithium batteries are one of the most popular kinds of batteries used in portable electronic devices, this new rule could affect plenty of travelers.

This is not a terrorism-based threat - lithium batteries could apparently explode if overheated. Such a circumstance seems kind of unlikely, and even FAA safety testing found only that a problem would occur if an entire shipment of lithium batteries were overheated in the cargo hold, but the Department of Transport is playing it safe and banning loose lithium batteries.

So how does this affect you? The rules go like this:

• You can have lithium batteries in checked baggage if they are installed inside an electronic device
• If you use rechargeable lithium batteries and want to bring spares, there is a limit of two per passenger, and they must be in your carry-on luggage, in plastic bags.

The plastic bag rule is designed to keep batteries from forming circuits and thus having a higher risk of overheating; if you carry the battery in its original packaging, that has the same effect.