Experimental study of lithium-ion battery cooling using mixture of phase change materials

Abstract

Phase change materials (PCM) are of attractive interest in electricity storage and power management applications. In this paper, PCMs are used for thermal management of an electric battery pack. Paraffin with a melting temperature of 58°C, OM35 with melting temperature of 35°C, two PCMs (paraffin and OM 35) were used for the study, as mixtures at two different ratios (50 : 50 and 60 : 40). Computations and experiments were allotted to estimate the heat transfer, solidifying and melting characteristics of the PCM utilised in the Li-ion cell battery module. Since PCM has low thermal conduction, thermal improvement techniques were investigated by inserting the copper plate into the PCM mixtures to boost the thermal conduction. PCM combination 50 : 50 is capable of holding battery running temperature compared to PCM combination 60 : 40. PCM combination 50 : 50 evidences to be ideal and lowered the operating temperature of the battery pack to 47°C.