(Digital Presentation) Mathematical Modeling of Thermal Events for Electrification Applications: Challenges and Opportunities

Abstract

In support of GM’s traction battery efforts, we have derived and implemented a method to link the heat generation due to chemical and electrochemical sources during a thermal event to the thermal runaway and thermal propagation of a battery module and a battery pack. Mathematical modeling of thermal runaway and propagation provides critical design insights and has become an important part of the electric vehicle (EV) development process. This talk covers multiple modeling methods with various levels of details to drive battery back and battery module design, as well as battery cell selection from a coarse to fine level. At a cell level, thermal runaway and propagation kinetics can be simulated and linked to characteristics of the battery cell design, from molecular, electrode, and jellyroll packaging level.At the module, pack, and vehicle level, a Conjugated Heat Transfer (CHT) method alongside with the Computational Fluid Dynamics (CFD) can be used to describe flow and heat transfer conditions inside and outside of the vehicle. Integrating all of these analysis in the design and development process provides a powerful way to optimize key thermal runaway mitigation components for electric vehicles.