Multi-physics design of a new battery packaging for electric vehicles utilizing multifunctional composites

Abstract

A multi-physics optimization framework is presented to design a new battery packaging for electric vehicles (EV). This battery packaging utilizes two types of multifunctional composites: structural battery composites (SBC) and microvascular composites (MVC). SBC has profound potential in harvesting electrical energy, and MVC shows promising capability in providing thermal regulation for battery packs. The proposed optimization scheme is aimed to maximize the driving range of EVs while making sure that the battery pack during operation would not overheat and also shows promising mechanical integrity. To reduce the computational burden of this multi-physics problem, a new reduced-order thermal/hydraulic model for transient analysis of MVC is proposed in this study as a part of the optimization framework. The thickness of constituents in the battery cell, carbon fiber volume fraction of the electrodes, number of microvascular composite panels for thermal regulations, and fiber directions in the battery cell plies are considered as design parameters. A parametric study is performed to evaluate the effect of each one of these design parameters on the driving range of an EV as well as overheating and structural integrity of battery packaging. The optimized battery packaging design obtained from the suggested optimization framework shows about a 23% increase in the driving range of Tesla model S.