Performance analysis and comparison study of liquid cooling-based shell-and-tube battery thermal management systems

Abstract

To meet the temperature control requirements of lithium-ion batteries (LIBs) under high rate discharge conditions, this study designed two structurally similar shell-and-tube battery thermal management (BTM) schemes, namely air-cooled/liquid cooled coupling scheme and phase change material (PCM)/liquid cooled coupling scheme. By applying simulation methods to analyze and compare the battery temperature control performance of two schemes under different working conditions, and adopting structural optimization and heat dissipation strategies to decrease the maximum temperature and temperature difference of the battery. It can be concluded that the maximum temperature of the batteries in both cooling schemes remains below 333 K after the number of baffle plates is increased from 2 to 6 during 5C discharge. Among them, the PCM/liquid cooling scheme demonstrates superior temperature control capabilities. However, the air cooling/liquid cooling scheme can also effectively reduce the temperature difference of the battery pack to 4.7 K by frequently switching the ventilation direction. The temperature difference of the battery can be further reduced by enhancing the thermal conductivity of composite phase change materials (CPCM). It is worth noting that increasing the liquid cooling flow rate to 2.5 m/s no longer improves the cooling effect of the battery. Additionally, during each discharge stage of cyclic charging and discharging, intermittently turning off the water pump for 9 min results in the battery exhibiting favorable temperature cycling characteristics.