Modeling and optimization of an enhanced battery thermal management system in electric vehicles

doi:10.1007/s11465-018-0520-z

Front. Mech. Eng.

2019, Vol. 14

Issue (1) : 65-75 https://doi.org/10.1007/s11465-018-0520-z

RESEARCH ARTICLE

Modeling and optimization of an enhanced battery thermal management system in electric vehicles

Mao LI^1,², Yuanzhi LIU¹, Xiaobang WANG^1,³, Jie ZHANG¹(

)

¹. Department of Mechanical Engineering, The University of Texas at Dallas, Richardson, TX 75080, USA
². Beijing Institute of Aerospace Testing Technology, Beijing 100074, China
³. School of Mechanical Engineering, Dalian University of Technology, Dalian 116024, China

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Abstract

This paper models and optimizes an air-based battery thermal management system (BTMS) in a battery module with 36 battery lithium-ion cells. A design of experiments is performed to study the effects of three key parameters (i.e., mass flow rate of cooling air, heat flux from the battery cell to the cooling air, and passage spacing size) on the battery thermal performance. Three metrics are used to evaluate the BTMS thermal performance, including (i) the maximum temperature in the battery module, (ii) the temperature uniformity in the battery module, and (iii) the pressure drop. It is found that (i) increasing the total mass flow rate may result in a more non-uniform distribution of the passage mass flow rate among passages, and (ii) a large passage spacing size may worsen the temperature uniformity on the battery walls. Optimization is also performed to optimize the passage spacing size. Results show that the maximum temperature difference of the cooling air in passages is reduced from 23.9 to 2.1 K by 91.2%, and the maximum temperature difference among the battery cells is reduced from 25.7 to 6.4 K by 75.1%.

Keywords thermal management electric vehicle lithium-ion battery temperature uniformity design optimization

Corresponding Author(s): Jie ZHANG

Just Accepted Date: 10 May 2018 Online First Date: 04 June 2018 Issue Date: 30 November 2018

Cite this article:

Mao LI,Yuanzhi LIU,Xiaobang WANG, et al. Modeling and optimization of an enhanced battery thermal management system in electric vehicles[J]. Front. Mech. Eng., 2019, 14(1): 65-75.

URL:

https://academic.hep.com.cn/fme/EN/10.1007/s11465-018-0520-z
https://academic.hep.com.cn/fme/EN/Y2019/V14/I1/65

Fig.1 Battery module model

Tab.1 A design of experiments for the three key parameters

Tab.2 Boundary condition types

Fig.2 The temperature distribution of the cooling air

Fig.3 Effects of mass flow rates on the (a) maximum temperature difference and pressure drop, (b) maximum temperature on the battery cell, and (c) passage mass flow rate

Fig.4 Effects of the heat flux on the (a) maximum temperature difference and pressure drop, (b) passage mass flow rate, and (c) maximum temperature on the battery cell

Fig.5 Effects of the passage spacing size on the (a) maximum temperature difference and pressure drop, (b) maximum temperature on the battery cell, and (c) passage mass flow rate

Fig.6 Distributions of the (a) velocity on the mid-plane in the first passage, and (b) passage pressure drop with different passage spacing sizes

Fig.7 Distributions of the (a) passage spacing size, (b) maximum temperature on the battery cell, and (c) passage mass flow rate for M0 and M1

Fig.8 Distributions of the (a) passage spacing size, (b) maximum temperature on the battery cell, and (c) passage mass flow rate for M0, M2, M3, and M4

Cases	$Δ T a ? ? ? ? max ?$ /K	$Δ T max ?$ /K	Pressure drop/Pa
M0	23.9	25.3	212.08
M1	85.4	100.6	245.35
M2	10.1	16.1	229.37
M3	4.9	10.5	230.82
M4	2.1	7.6	229.43

Tab.3 Maximum temperature difference of the cooling air among the passages (

Δ T a ? ? ? ? max ?

), maximum temperature difference among the battery cells (

Δ T max ?

), and pressure drop in different cases

Fig.9 Distributions of the (a) passage spacing size and passage mass flow rate, (b) the air temperature at the passage outlet and the maximum temperature on the battery cell for M4 and M5, and (c) temperature contours in the rear passages in M5

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