3D electro-thermal modelling and experimental validation of lithium polymer-based batteries for automotive applications

Summary This article presents an electro‐thermal model of a stack of three lithium ion batteries for automotive applications. This tool can help to predict thermal behaviour of battery cells inside a stack. The open source software OpenFOAM provides the possibility to add heat generation because of Joule losses in a CFD model. Heat sources are introduced at the connectors and are calculated as a function of battery discharge current and internal resistance. The internal resistance is described in function of temperature. Simulation results are validated against experimental results with regard to cooling air flow field characteristic and thermal behaviour of the cell surface. The validation shows that the simulation is capable to anticipate air flow field characteristics inside the battery box. It also predicts correctly the thermal behaviour of the battery cells for various discharge rates and different cooling system conditions. The simulation supports the observation that batteries have a higher temperature close to the connectors and that the temperature increase depends highly on discharge rate and cooling system conditions. Copyright © 2016 John Wiley & Sons, Ltd.