Comparison of different cooling methods for lithium ion battery cells

Choosing a proper cooling method for a lithium-ion (Li-ion) battery pack for electric drive vehicles (EDVs) and making an optimal cooling control strategy to keep the temperature at a optimal range of 15 °C to 35 °C is essential to increasing safety, extending the pack service life, and reducing costs. When choosing a cooling method and developing strategies, trade-offs need to be made among many facets such as costs, complexity, weight, cooling effects, temperature uniformity, and parasitic power. This paper considers four cell-cooling methods: air cooling, direct liquid cooling, indirect liquid cooling, and fin cooling. To evaluate their effectiveness, these methods are assessed using a typical large capacity Li-ion pouch cell designed for EDVs from the perspective of coolant parasitic power consumption, maximum temperature rise, temperature difference in a cell, and additional weight used for the cooling system. We use a state-of-the-art Li-ion battery electro-chemical thermal model. The results show that under our assumption an air-cooling system needs 2 to 3 more energy than other methods to keep the same average temperature; an indirect liquid cooling system has the lowest maximum temperature rise; and a fin cooling system adds about 40% extra weight of cell, which weighs most, when the four kinds cooling methods have the same volume. Indirect liquid cooling is a more practical form than direct liquid cooling though it has slightly lower cooling performance.