Innovative System Design and Numerical Investigation Based on Air Cooling and Baffle Utilization in the Thermal Management of Lithium Ion Batteries

Thermal management of lithium-ion batteries is necessary to ensure a range of applications’ efficiency and safety, from portable electronics to automotive. This paper analyses and designs a new air-cooling thermal management system for lithium-ion batteries. The new system design suggests an arrangement of baffles, leading to a more uniform distribution of airflow between battery cells. In this way, a system with front and rear air inlets and an outlet above them is able to create an improved airflow compared to standard designs. The new design is also analysed against a conventional air cooling design system, which consists of a counter design of airflow with front air inlets and rear outlet

designs with baffles. Thermal performance of the two systems – maximum temperature of the battery and the maximum temperature differential in the battery pack – are evaluated using Computational Fluid Dynamics (CFD). Three different inlet air temperatures are used (299.15 K, 294.15 K, and 289.15 K) with steady flow (0.5 m/s) battery velocity at the pack entrance. Results exemplify how the new design has the ability to lower the peak temperature of the batteries, and more evenly distribute the temperatures across the batteries.

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