A Compact Hybrid Battery Thermal Management System for Enhanced Cooling

TL;DR

This paper introduces a compact hybrid battery thermal management system combining nanofluid cooling, phase change materials, and pulsed flow to improve lithium-ion battery cooling efficiency, safety, and lifespan in electric vehicles.

Contribution

It proposes a novel compact hybrid cooling system with multi-inlet microchannels, nanofluid cooling, and pulsed flow, validated by experiments and optimized through a thermal-fluid dynamics model.

Findings

Maximum battery temperature reduced by 3.44°C at 1C discharge rate.

Battery charge cycles increased by 6-15%.

Hybrid cooling consumes only 5% more power than conventional methods.

Abstract

Hybrid battery thermal management systems (HBTMS) combining active liquid cooling and passive phase change materials (PCM) cooling have shown a potential for the thermal management of lithium-ion batteries. However, the fill volume of coolant and PCM in hybrid cooling systems is limited by the size and weight of the HBTMS at high charge/discharge rates. These limitations result in reduced convective heat transfer from the coolant during discharge. The liquefaction rate of PCM is accelerated and the passive cooling effect is reduced. In this paper, we propose a compact hybrid cooling system with multi-inlet U-shaped microchannels for which the gap between channels is embedded by PCM/aluminum foam for compactness. Nanofluid cooling (NC) technology with better thermal conductivity is used. A pulsed flow function is further developed for enhanced cooling (EC) with reduced power consumption. An experimentally validated thermal-fluid dynamics model is developed to optimize operating conditions including coolant type, cooling direction, channel height, inlet flow rate, and cooling scheme. The results show that the hybrid cooling solution of NC+PCM+EC adopted by HBTMS further reduces the maximum temperature of the Li-ion battery by 3.44{\deg}C under a discharge rate of 1C at room temperature of 25{\deg}C with only a 5% increase in power consumption, compared to the conventional liquid cooling method for electric vehicles (EV). The average number of battery charges has increased by about 6 to 15 percent. The results of this study can help improve the range as well as driving safety of new energy EV.