Advanced Battery Thermal Control and Thermal Run-Away Cascading Prevention System Using Thermal Phase Change Materials

该项目为电动汽车锂离子电池提供了一种低成本、高效率的热管理系统解决方案，同时消除了热失控和级联风险。由于对高功率、高能量密度、高安全性和高成本的要求，这种级别的安全和性能在电动汽车等应用中尤其重要。在不影响冷却能力的同时防止热失控和级联风险的关键创新之一是通过相变材料实现的，这些材料在正常工作温度下处于固态-允许与冷却剂进行热量传递。然而，在正常运行之外的极端温度条件下--如在热失控期间--相同的材料相变为渗透形式，以允许冷却剂直接阻止受影响的电池单元的热失控。因此，这一机制在关键的“失控”温度之前局部和精确地散热，从而阻止任何“级联效应”或连锁反应影响相邻细胞的可能性。我们解决方案中的另一个重要安全特征是低成本的细胞级温度传感器，它可以监测单个细胞的温度，以主动管理任何有缺陷或问题的细胞。这种方法还可以防止对相邻单元产生任何潜在的级联影响。该电子系统与物理液体冷却循环一起工作，将所需的冷却引导到特定的电池模块。因此，热控系统可以基于特定模块内的精确电池数据进行操作，这使得电池管理具有预测性和主动性，而不是反应性-使维护和维护变得更简单，并始终有针对性。最后，该系统的整个建设和工程都考虑到了寿命结束处理。该设计使用简单、低成本的部件，在2分钟内即可完成组装和拆卸。这一独特的功能使报废回收和再利用比其他类型的电池制造和组装过程简单得多。事实上，设计的一个关键动机是每个模块都可以重新用于其他能源应用--例如太阳能存储--因为电动汽车电池组在车辆使用寿命结束时的剩余容量高达80%。在大多数情况下，这些模块可以作为可再生能源存储或备份设备在第二次生命中使用长达十年。

"This project offers a solution for a low cost and highly efficient thermal management system for Li-Ion battery in electric vehicles while eliminating thermal runaway and cascading risks. This level of safety and performance is especially important in applications such as in electric vehicles due to requirements of high power, energy density, safety and cost.One of the key innovations to prevent thermal runaway and cascading risk while not affecting cooling ability is accomplished by phase change materials that are in solid state during normal operating temperature - allowing heat transfer with coolant. However, in extreme temperature conditions outside normal operation - as during thermal runaway - the same materials phase change to permeable form to allow coolant to directly halt thermal runaway of the affected battery cell. Therefore, this mechanism locally and precisely dissipate heat before critical ""runaway"" temperature hence cease any possibility of the ""cascading effect"" or chain reaction from affecting adjacent cells.Another important safety feature in our solutions is the low cost cell-level temperature sensors that can monitor temperature of individual cells to proactively manage any defective or problem cells. This approach also prevent any potential cascading effect to adjacent cells. This electronic system works in conjunction with the physical liquid cooling cycle to direct needed cooling to specific battery module. As a result, the thermal control system can act based on precise cell data within specific module which allow battery management to be predictive and proactive rather than reactive - making servicing and maintenance simpler and always targeted.Finally, the entire construction and engineering of this system take end-of-life treatment into consideration. The design enables assembly and disassembly in 2 minutes using simple and low cost components. This unique feature allows end-of-life recycling and reuse to be much simpler than other types of battery manufacturing and assembly processes. In fact, a key motivation for the design is that each module can be repurposed for other energy applications - such as solar storage - as EV battery pack has remaining capacity of up to 80% at the end of vehicle's useful life. In most situation, these module can remains useful for often up to a decade for a second life as renewable energy storage or backup devices."