The effect of outer container geometry on the thermal management of lithium-ion batteries with a combination of phase change material and metal foam

Abstract

The use of PCM for thermal management of the batteries has an important place among passive cooling methods because it does not require pump or fan power. In battery cooling applications with PCM, it was aimed to increase the thermal conductivity of the PCM and to cool the battery better by using fins, nanoparticles, and metal foam. The novelty of this study is to investigate the effect of outer container geometry on battery temperature in battery cooling with PCM + metal foam composition. In this direction, five different container geometries affecting the heat transfer by conduction and convection were analyzed. The parametric study was carried out for different values of convection heat transfer coefficient, heat generation in the battery, PCM amount, and porosity. The lowest battery temperature for a given discharge time was obtained in triangular container geometry. With the use of a triangular container, the battery temperature was reduced between 0.4 % and 14.42 % compared to the use of a circular container, depending on the parameter values. The analysis findings revealed that the outer container geometry is more effective in the thermal management of the battery for conditions with low convection heat transfer coefficient and high heat generation.