Thermal analysis and fluidodynamic optimization of a battery cold plate for electric vehicle applications

Nowadays, electric mobility is where a major part of investments and research efforts is involved; in the next years, to overcome the problem of global heating and the rise of pollution levels, electric vehicles will take the place of internal combustion engines. The battery pack is the key component of this transition and its thermal management is essential to protect the cells and ensure their life does not decrease to a level where replacing the whole pack becomes necessary. The aim of this work is to design a cold plate for a liquid cooling system for a battery module made of 64 cells, starting from an initial and simple configuration and developing the geometry, until an optimum is reached. Cells' maximum temperature, pressure drop and flow velocity are considered as the main optimization parameters.