John, at work weve had an overdischarged A123 cell which started to leak when it was being charged again. The chemicals released (HF) caused a stinging sensation in the eyes, they are definetly not good for you. That being sayed Cadmium is also very dangerous.

Cell balancing is highly recommended, but I think its ok to do it at the end of charge time. If you state as a rule that cell balancing is obligatory, it can be interpreted that it is enough to do the balancing at charge time. Lets leave it to the tech-checkers.
There are some cells which dont even need a cell balancer, but a123s are not one of them.

For me its frustrating to deal with lithium batteries at work all the time, while they are outlawed in Robotwars. Id rather deal with some strict rules I know I can implement, then some of the weird rules that have been circulating. No rules at all would be fine by me, there is no risk of flameballs. Yet, to keep health-safety into account it may be a good idea to make sure the chances of chemicals being released are minimized.
If they are safe enough (not more dangerous than NiCd), what are we waiting for? If I can be sure we can run them, Ill order them. Right now, were just waiting for them to be allowed and its taking a long time.
I just hope that this wont be as much of an issue with other new technologies as they emerge.