Combined Experimental and Numerical Approach for the Thermal Heat Exchange Investigation of Li-Ion Cells for Automotive Applications

Abstract

Abstract Lithium-ion (Li-ion) battery is an advanced technology in the field of electrochemical energy storage, but its management constitutes one of the most intriguing challenges for electric vehicles. Many parameters need to be controlled and managed and many aspects need to be optimised. This work presents a methodology for laboratory characterization of Nickel Manganese Cobalt (NMC) Lithium-Ion batteries suited for automotive applications. The purpose consists of obtaining a detailed description of the electrical and thermal behaviour of a single battery cell to provide an accurate model (static, dynamic, and thermal) that could ensure optimized real-time battery management by a management system for several battery packs. A battery testing system was built using a bidirectional power supply and a software/hardware interface was implemented within the National Instruments LabVIEW environment that monitors current, voltage and temperature sensors. This dedicated laboratory equipment can be used to apply and report charging/discharging cycles according to the user-defined load profile. A bidimensional CFD dynamic condition/transient simulation in the Ansys FLUENT environment was performed to study the heat thermal fluxes generated by a determined current value in the battery cells, and the results have been compared to the experimental data for validation.