Choosing a proper cooling method for a lithium-ion (Li-ion) battery pack for electric drive vehicles (EDVs) and making an optimal cooling control strategy to keep the temperature at a optimal range of 15 °C to 35 °C is essential to increasing safety, extending the pack service life, and reducing costs.
What temperature should a lithium ion battery pack be cooled to?
Choosing a proper cooling method for a lithium-ion (Li-ion) battery pack for electric drive vehicles (EDVs) and making an optimal cooling control strategy to keep the temperature at a optimal range of 15 °C to 35 °C is essential to increasing safety, extending the pack service life, and reducing costs.
How to cool a Li-ion battery pack?
Heat pipe cooling for Li-ion battery pack is limited by gravity, weight and passive control . Currently, air cooling, liquid cooling, and fin cooling are the most popular methods in EDV applications. Some HEV battery packs, such as those in the Toyota Prius and Honda Insight, still use air cooling.
Performed 3D electrochemical-thermal modeling of four battery cooling methods. Thermal performance of direct air cooling, direct liquid cooling, indirect (jacket) liquid and fin cooling are compared. Merits and limitations of each cooling method for occupying a fixed volume are summarized.
Which type of cooling method should be used for EDV battery packs?
Indirect liquid cooling has been adopted by the Chevrolet Volt, and Tesla Model S. A123 used fins for heat removal and achieved temperature uniformity. A fierce debate is ongoing about which kind of cooling method should be applied to EDV battery packs.
Electrochemical Society Member. Cooling electrical tabs of the cell instead of the lithium ion cell surfaces has shown to provide better thermal uniformity within the cell, but its ability to remove heat is limited by the heat transfer bottleneck between tab and electrode stack.
The author examined the cooling system when utilizing two different cooling materials, at first the system was designed using copper foam filled with paraffin, whereas the other one only contained a commercial PCM, RT 25HC from Rubitherm, with a melting point of 25 °C.