Numerical Improvement of Battery Thermal Management Integrating Phase Change Materials with Fin-Enhanced Liquid Cooling

Bo Wang (), Changzhi Jiao and Shiheng Zhang
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Bo Wang: School of Energy and Power Engineering, University of Shanghai for Science and Technology, Shanghai 200093, China
Changzhi Jiao: School of Energy and Power Engineering, University of Shanghai for Science and Technology, Shanghai 200093, China
Shiheng Zhang: School of Energy and Power Engineering, University of Shanghai for Science and Technology, Shanghai 200093, China

Energies, 2025, vol. 18, issue 9, 1-15

Abstract: Under high-rate charging and discharging conditions, the coupling of phase change materials (PCMs) with liquid cooling proves to be an effective approach for controlling battery pack operating temperature and performance. To address the inherent low thermal conductivity of PCM and enhance heat transfer from PCM to cooling plates, numerical simulations were conducted to investigate the effects of installing fins between the upper and lower cooling plates on temperature distribution. The results demonstrated that merely adding cooling plates on battery surfaces and filling PCM in inter-cell gaps had limited effectiveness in reducing maximum temperatures during 4C discharge (8A discharge current), achieving only a 1.8 K reduction in peak temperature while increasing the maximum temperature difference to over 10 K. Cooling plates incorporating optimized flow channel configurations in fins, alternating coolant inlet/outlet arrangements, appropriate increases in coolant flow rate (0.5 m/s), and reduced coolant inlet temperature (293.15 K) could maintain battery pack temperatures below 306 K while constraining maximum temperature differences to approximately 5 K during 4C discharge. Although increased flow rates enhanced cooling efficiency, improvements became negligible beyond 0.7 m/s due to inherent limitations in battery and PCM thermal conductivity. Excessively low coolant inlet temperatures (293.15 K) were found to adversely affect maximum temperature difference control during initial discharge phases. While reducing the inlet temperature from 300.65 K to 293.15 K decreased the maximum temperature by 10.1 K, it concurrently increased maximum temperature difference by 0.44 K.

Keywords: battery thermal management; high-rate charging and discharging; phase change material; fin-enhanced liquid cooling; numerical simulation (search for similar items in EconPapers)
JEL-codes: Q Q0 Q4 Q40 Q41 Q42 Q43 Q47 Q48 Q49 (search for similar items in EconPapers)
Date: 2025
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