Numerical study of Thermal management of lithium-ion battery pack using liquid cooling

Thermal management of the battery deals with reducing the temperature of the battery pack as well as maintaining the equal temperature distribution among all cells in the battery pack. This paper deals with the thermal management of battery cells with liquid cooling to maintain equal temperature among all the cells in the battery pack. This study starts with thermal analysis of a single battery cell with numerical analysis and validates its results with experimental analysis. Further this we have done thermal management of battery pack with liquid cooling. By using the symmetry condition of the battery pack we have considered six cells in a row with an aluminum block kept between two cells. The two faces in the aluminum block contact with cells. Two faces of the aluminum block were kept in the shape of an arc which is the same as the arc of a cell in order to get more heat transfer area. These aluminum blocks are penetrated by five circular channels in order to flow coolant and hinged with the channel. Numerical simulation is done on this in Ansys Fluent software to get temperature distribution graphs of all six cells and to find the maximum temperature of cells. After this validation done with a previous literature study followed by thermal analysis of battery pack with different channel sizes, their shape, and changing coolant from water to Ethylene Glycol. Results of this study include a comparison of thermal behavior of battery cells at different conditions by using temperature, heat transfer, and pump work parameters in order to get the optimized design of thermal management system with liquid cooling with better thermal performance.