Electric vehicle (EV) batteries and power electronics use liquid cold plates with a network of specialized cooling channels to manage high density heat generation from multiple thermal sources. The optimal design of these cold plates can facilitate efficient heat extraction with minimal temperature non-uniformity. With the advent of additive manufacturing techniques, it is possible to develop intricate cooling passages to deliver the desired functionality. This study aims to investigate the thermal-hydraulic characteristics of a three-dimensional (3D) non-uniform layered channel configuration at high discharge rates (3C to 9C).
In this study, gradient-based sensitivity analysis is performed for both traditional and topology-based configurations. Thus, shape adaptation is achieved to facilitate uniform thermal characteristics. In this process, a planar uniform layered configuration is morphed into a non-uniform layered configuration with planar variations along the thickness of the cold plate. The surface roughness of the additively built cold plate, is experimentally measured using white-light interferometry. The derived roughness variability is numerically modeled in the conjugate heat transfer (CHT) simulations. For the pouch cell, a semi-empirical electrochemistry-based Newman–Tiedemann–Gu–Kim (NTGK) model is used for performing simulations at high discharge rates.
It is observed that, three-dimensional shape adaptation to topology-based configuration, significantly enhances the cold plate performance. This has yielded more than 10% improvement in thermal uniformity and a minimum temperature gradient across the cold plate surface. The parametric roughness model used in the present work has resulted in better numerical accuracy, with an error less than 7%. Thus, the electrochemistry-coupled cold plate battery analysis demonstrated the outperformance of the adjoint configuration at high discharge rates.
Additively manufactured cold plate designs, that incorporate accurate roughness effects have the potential to advance battery thermal management systems at high discharge rates.
Effective thermal management is crucial in high-density power systems. Accounting for the inherent roughness present in an additively manufactured cold plate into the numerical model, achieves more accurate predictions and facilitates improved battery thermal management.
In this study, surface roughness is experimentally measured, and numerically modeled for the CHT. The non-uniform flow architecture along the thickness is obtained by adjoint formulation to enhance thermal performance of the cold plate. The pouch cell-coupled cold plate is then analyzed to investigate the influence of different C-rates using electrochemical modeling.
