Insights into lithium plating characteristics enable plating-free heating strategy for bidirectional pulse utilizing a refined physics-based model

Abstract

Bidirectional pulse heating, known for its fast heating rate and good consistency, is a promising preheating solution for addressing the dilemma of poor performance of lithium-ion batteries (LIBs) at low temperatures. But applying this method to batteries, particularly at high state-of-charges (SOCs), can increase the risk of lithium plating, which in turn raises the potential for thermal runaway. Here, we introduce a refined physics-based model to explore, for the first time, the lithium plating behavior during the bidirectional pulse heating process. Further, we propose a stepped rate pulse strategy based on the lithium precipitation temperature boundary, designed to rapidly warm batteries without inducing lithium plating. Our findings reveal that both capacity loss and the onset temperature for lithium plating increase with higher SOCs and pulse rates. Moreover, due to the uneven temperature distribution, the lithium plating current at the cell periphery is larger compared to that inside the cell, and the outmost cell experiences a more severe capacity loss than the internal cell in a module. The plating-free heating rate varies at different SOC levels and exhibits a 1.5 times improvement as the SOC decreases from 0.5 to 0.2. This study contributes to an enhanced comprehension of lithium plating characteristics and offers invaluable insights into the design of efficient and safe pulse heating strategies.