Novel thermal management methods to improve the performance of the Li-ion batteries in high discharge current applications

• Published in: Energy (Oxford) 2021-06, Vol.224, p.120165, Article 120165
• Main Authors: Behi, Hamidreza, Karimi, Danial, Jaguemont, Joris, Gandoman, Foad Heidari, Kalogiannis, Theodoros, Berecibar, Maitane, Van Mierlo, Joeri
• Format: Article
• Language: English
• Subjects: Aerodynamics; Air cooling; Air temperature; Computational fluid dynamics; Computer applications; Convection; Convection cooling; Cooling; Cooling systems; Discharge; Evaporative cooling; Fluid dynamics; Forced convection; Free convection; Heat pipe; Heat pipes; Hydrodynamics; Lithium; Lithium-ion batteries; Lithium-ion battery; Management methods; Modules; Optimization; Performance enhancement; Rechargeable batteries; Robustness (mathematics); Thermal management
• ISSN: 0360-5442; 1873-6785
• DOI: 10.1016/j.energy.2021.120165

Over the last few decades investigating the performance of thermal management in the high charge/discharge current has been taken into consideration in many studies. In this study, a mature heat pipe-based air cooling system is built to control the temperature of the lithium-ion (Li-ion) cell/module in the high current (184 A) discharging rate. The temperature of the cell/module experimentally and numerically is considered by the lack of natural convection, natural convection, forced convection, and evaporative cooling. According to the experimental results, the natural and forced convection decrease the average temperature of the cell by 6.2% and 33.7% respectively. Moreover, several numerical simulations are solved by COMSOL Multiphysics®, the commercial computational fluid dynamics (CFD) software. The simulation results are validated against experimental results at the cell level for natural and forced convection. It indicates that the evaporative cooling method is robust to enhance the current cooling system method for further optimization. The results show that there is a 35.8% and 23.8% reduction in the maximum temperature of the cell and module due to the effect of the evaporative cooling method respectively. •A heat pipe-based air cooling system is suggested for the high current applications.•A CFD model using COMSOL is developed and validated with experimental results.•Natural convection, forced convection, and evaporative cooling has been investigated.