Modeling and thermal simulation of a PHEV battery module with cylindrical LFP cells

Abstract

Generally a part of electric vehicle diffusion is still based on marketing of cars and vans suitable for specific use like work vehicles. A flexible design methodology is required to support rapid prototyping and product customization in the market of tailored EV/PHEV. The research focuses the cooling simulation for a PHEV Li-Ion battery. The thermal analysis is based on the physical parameters of the single cell and on the experimental data. The proposed methodology concerns firstly an analytical approach which evaluates the average heat generated by a single cell during working condition. Then the proposed virtual prototyping analysis has been divided into two levels: the thermal simulation of one cell, and the CFD analysis of a battery module. This workflow has been applied to support the design of a battery pack for a prototypal ecological hybrid vehicle. That test case vehicle is a small van, used for the curbside collection, which has in parallel an internal combustion engine and an electric motor supplied by a LFP battery with small cylindrical cells. The analysis concerns one of the four module which constitutes the whole battery pack. The virtual model has been parameterized and the behavior of air cooling system has been evaluated through virtual tools.