Advanced Automotive Battery Conference (AABC), 04.-08.02.

2013, Pasadena, California

SIMULATIVE COMPARISON OF BALANCING ALGORITHMS

FOR ACTIVE AND PASSIVE CELL BALANCING SYSTEMS
FOR LITHIUM-ION BATTERIES
Christian Fleischera,c,*, Bastian Ostendorpa, Dirk Uwe Sauera,b,c
(a) Electrochemical Energy Conversion and Storage Systems Group, Institute for Power Electronics
and Electrical Drives (ISEA), RWTH Aachen University, Germany
(b) Institute for Power Generation and Storage Systems (PGS), E.ON ERC, RWTH Aachen University,
Germany
(c) Jülich Aachen Research Alliance, JARA-Energy, Germany

(*) Corresponding author: Christian Fleischer

Institute for Power Electronics and Electrical Drives (ISEA), RWTH Aachen University, Jägerstrasse.
17/19, 52066 Aachen, Germany, Email: batteries@isea.rwth-aachen.de

Abstract. The battery management system has 1. Introduction

the task of maximizing the lifetime of the
accumulator while optimizing availability and
reliability. To achieve high system voltages,
many individual cells are connected in series.
Due to the fact that individual cells in a battery
differ in manufacturing and diverse
progressive aging, the overall performance of
the system is limited by the weakest or most
charged cell. Furthermore, each cell has an
individual voltage and temperature
characteristic. Therefore, in case that only the
stack voltage is monitored, there is a risk that a
cell undergoes a high voltage and leads to
irreversible damage, fire or explosion. To
prevent the aforementioned divergence of
cells, the individual voltages have to be
measured and the charging process adjusted.
Today, to minimize the problem of different
cells, typically passively managed-charge
equalization techniques are used to balance the
voltage of the cells. Active systems, which
transfer energy between cells, gain more
attention. Therefore, the paper discusses pro
and cons of the balancing methods as well as
its corresponding control strategies. by
implementing the models to decide, when it is
useful and appropriate to apply the passive or
active system.
Electro-mobility has gained high importance.
Considering the ability of electrified vehicles
to store electrical energy and their targeted
growth rate on the car market, electrified
vehicles have the potential to contribute to an
overall sustainable energy supply by serving as
intermediate stores for surplus renewables-
based power in a smart grid. However, a lot of
challenges have to be faced on that way. Apart
from new infrastructures (charging stations),
additional technical components in the car and
the advancements in energy management, one
of the bottlenecks is still the energy storage.
Costs, space, weight, long life cycle and
especially safety are the main factors to be
optimized. Among all battery technologies,
lithium-ion batteries are considered by most of
the car manufacturers to meet the requirements
in the best way, because of their high energy
and power density. Nevertheless, safety
aspects still play an important role especially
for lithium-ion batteries. Operation limits, such
as maximum/minimum cell voltage,
temperature or current, must not be exceeded.
An electrified vehicle incorporates not only
one battery cell, but one or several battery
packs. Each of them comprises multiple cells
either connected in series or in parallel or both.
Advanced Automotive Battery Conference (AABC), 04.-08.02.2013, Pasadena, California
These cells are not equal, even if they come
from the same supplier and from the same
production line, because battery production is
quite complex and uniformity in quality is still
a great challenge. Also, due to different self-
discharge rates or aging state the overall
performance of the system is limited by the
weakest or most charged cell. To prevent the
aforementioned divergence of cells in voltage
and capacity, cell balancing systems are used.
These systems are divided into two groups, the
dissipative (passive) and non-dissipative
(active) balancing systems. The passive
systems dissipate excess energy using resistors
in parallel to the cells while in active systems
the energy of the stronger cells is transferred to
weaker cells using capacitor-, inductor-, or
converter-based topologies. It is therefore the
objective of the present study to implement
and compare different topologies with its
control strategies to make a meaningful
statement of their performance in suitable
practices.
2. Battery Modeling
Firstly; to simulate battery behavior a battery
model was designed. Here, a dynamic model is
used to describe the electrical behavior of the
battery cells. This model based on electrical
equivalent circuit is parameterized based on
impedance spectroscopy and is characterized
by high dynamics and accuracy of the
current/voltage profile [1][2][3][8][11][13].
Figure 1: Equivalent circuit model
Figure 2: Representation of a ZARC-element using
three RC-elements
The model consists of one leakage inductance
Ls caused by connection, a serial internal
resistance and two ZARC elements to model
diffusion processes and is represented by five
RC-elements. The open-circuit voltage is
represented by a voltage source and depends
on the SoC.
3. Cell Balancing Systems
To achieve high system voltages, many
individual cells are connected in series. When
such a series connected system is charged, the
same current flows through each cell. This
means that the charging process must be
stopped when the first cell is fully charged.
Analogously, this means for the discharging
process, that it must be stopped as soon as the
first cell is completely discharged. This means
for a discharge, that residual charge is left in
the battery pack when the battery cells started
with different SoC. Basically there are two
obvious reasons for inequalities of SoC of cells
connected in series, firstly imbalance in state-
of-charge and secondly different cell
capacities. SoC imbalance is
In order to avoid or at least reduce such
inequalities among cells, balancing systems are
required. Different charging states of
individual cells may occur on the one side as
cells with different SoC were assembled to a
battery pack or have different self-discharge
rates.
Figure 3: Cell imbalance due to difference in self-
discharge, inital SoC or ageing [18]
The major differences in the capacity attribute
to the fact that even the production of the cells
Advanced Automotive Battery Conference (AABC), 04.-08.02.2013, Pasadena, California

underlies a degree of diversification. During though it has a lower SoC. The balancing
operation fluctuation in temperature leads also process starts while charging, where all
to diverse progressive aging (loss of capacity terminal cell voltages are measured and
and increase of internal resistance) of the cells. compared to find the most and least charged
cells. Lie this voltage values within a
3.1 Balancing strategy algorithms predefined range, here Vdelta = 0.05 V, charge is
To minimize the problem of different cells the not removed from the cells, otherwise
imbalance has to be detected and controlled by balancing takes place. It can be assumed that
the balancing algorithms, which are typically when the cells terminal voltage is equal, their
based on cell terminal voltage. OCV would be unevenly distributed and so
their SoC levels.
3.2 Voltage based controlled balancing
algorithm 3.3 OCV-based controlled balancing
This method is easy to implement but may be algorithm
counterproductive. It is based on the The advancement of the voltage based
assumption that cells have the same SoC if controlled balancing algorithm is based on the
their measured terminal voltage is equal, too. OCV value estimation rather than the terminal

Stop
charging

Determine
index of
VBat_max

VBat_min > VBat_max -Vdelta

Stop
balancing

VBat_min < VBat_max -Vdelta

Balancing
active

V[i] >= VBat_max -Vdelta V[i] < VBat_max -Vdelta

Cell not
Cell charged
charged

V[i_max] > VBat_max -Vdelta

V[i_max] <= VBat_max -Vdelta

Start charging

Figure 4: Voltage-based controlled balancing

algorithm
Figure 5: OCV-based controlled balancing
algorithm
However, this specification is rarely met and
only true for the open-circuit voltage
voltage. Beforehand, the OCV vs. SoC curves
conditions. For example, a more aged cell with
have to be measured on the test bench. The
higher internal resistance Ri may be classified
tables are extracted for a temperature range
as equal with a less aged neighboring cell due
between -20°C and 60°C and stored as lookup-
to the additional voltage drop across Ri even
Advanced Automotive Battery Conference (AABC), 04.-08.02.2013, Pasadena, California

tables. To estimate the OCV value during where , is the state-of-charge at the
operation the internal resistance is predicted beginning of the individual cell and the
and its voltage drop will subtracted/added as capacity of the cell. The corresponding excess
charge applies:
= − ∙
, = , − ,
And can be further be written as
In this way the open-circuit voltage of each
individual cell can be compared.
,
! , − ∙ 100%
3.4 SoC-based controlled balancing ,
=
algorithm
,
∙ 3600 s&h
This is the most sophisticated balancing Therefore, the time for how long balancing
strategy at the expense of computing power. It should last can be described as

Stop ' , − , ( ∙ 36 s&h ∙

charging
! , =
, , - , -
) *++ 5−6 7
SoC and IBat ∙ , ./0123,4
determination

Determine index iSoC_max & iSoC_min

Since the calculation and measurement of the
Determine ton
Activate timer current is corrupted by small errors,
it is necessary to reinitialize the state-of-charge
SoCBat_min > SoCBat_max -SoCdelta value at each complete full charge. Also
Stop
periodically, the capacity of the individual has
balancing to be adjusted.
SoCBat_min < SoCBat_max -SoCdelta

4. Cell Balancing Topologies

Balancing
active
SoC[i] >= SoCBat_max -SoCdelta
Cell not
charging
SoC[i_max] > SoCBat_max -SoCdelta
SoC[i_max] <= SoCBat_max -SoCdelta
Start charging
Figure 6: SoC-based controlled balancing algorithm
is based on the information of the SoC history
of each cell and the calculation of how long the
balancing has to be activated based on
= ,
finished==1
IL ==0
To prevent the aforementioned divergence of
cells, the individual cells have to be measured
SoC[i] < SoCBat_max -SoCdelta
and the charging process adjusted. Today, to
minimize the problem of different cells, mainly
Cell charging
two balancing technologies are applied:
Passive balancing: excessive energy from the
most charged cell is dissipated by parallel
connection of resistors. Typically passively
managed-charge equalization techniques are
used in electro mobility to balance the voltage
of the cells. On the other side, active systems
transfer the energy between cells without
wasting energy at the expense of a higher
number of components and complex controls.
4.1 Passive balancing topology
At passive cell balancing the highest charged
cell is indicated by its terminal voltage and
removes the energy through bypass resistors
+ until all cell show the same voltages.
3600
Advanced Automotive Battery Conference (AABC), 04.-08.02.2013, Pasadena, California
Figure 7: Summary of differnt cell balancing topologies [5][6][12][14]
The charging is normally stopped when the
strongest cell reaches the maximum charging
voltage which is assigned by the manufacturer.
Then the fully charged cells are discharged via
bypass resistors until they reach the same
charge level of the neighboring cells. .
Basically, the method may be applied at all
battery states (charging, discharging, idling).
Figure 8: Implemented model for passive balancing
system
The balancing time is determined by the
resistor value, which sets the balancing current.
The disadvantage of the passive systems is
obvious. To get good results it is important to
balance with lower balancing currents (reduced
voltage drop for Ri), but increases the
balancing time. Also, electric mobility
demands diligent use of the limited and
therefore valuable energy, therefore it is
paradox to waste the energy by the passive
system as described earlier.
4.2 Implemented model for active
balancing topology
As can be seen in Figure 7 there exists a large
variety of different active balancing methods in
Figure 9: Implemented model of flyback converter
as active balancing system [6][8][10][15][16][17]
the literature. Exemplarily one of these
methods, the flyback converter topology, is
used in this work for comparison with the
passive system applying the balancing
algorithms introduced in 3. Here, the primary
coil takes energy from the entire stack and
transfers it to the secondary coil, where the cell
has the least voltage. In case multiple cells are
balanced synchronously, the induced current
will be divided accordingly. The system is
designed in such a way, that a balancing
current from at least 0.1C is possible.
5. Simulation results
Here the results of the simulative comparison
between passive and active systems applying
Advanced Automotive Battery Conference (AABC), 04.-08.02.2013, Pasadena, California

different balancing algorithms are illustrated. As can be seen at the SoC-plot, the balancing
To verify the system a real driving cycle based on terminal voltage suffers in accuracy.
profile is used as battery load. The A usable capacity of 46,02 Ah is removed
implemented battery pack consisting of 26 from the macro-cell.
18650 round cells connected in parallel
(macro-cell) and 10 in series. The macro-cell is
illustrated in Figure 10. Its capacity is 53,3 Ah
and its energy ~2kWh [4].

Figure 10: Implemented macro-cell model to

compare algorithms in passive and active balancing Figure 12: Voltage-based balancing method, (top)
systems measured voltages of the strongest and weakest cell
in macro-cell; (bottom) corresponding
activated/deactivated switches
5.1 Active balancing using voltage-based
algorithm
5.2 Active balancing using OCV-based
The first test was conducted using the well-
algorithm
known and state of the art technique in The improved verison, of the voltage-based
electrical vehicles nowadays. algorithm, the OCV-based method is tested.

Figure 11: SoC distribution in the macro-cell after

driving cycle applying voltage-based strategy
Advanced Automotive Battery Conference (AABC), 04.-08.02.2013, Pasadena, California

this method results in the best balanced battery

pack. The difference in cell 1 and cell 1 can be

Figure 15: SoC distribution in the macro-cell after

Figure 13: SoC distribution in the macro-cell after
driving cycle applying OCV-based strategy
driving cycle applying SoC-based strategy
almost be equalized. The control tolerance is
set to 0.5% in SoC difference. The usable
capacity based on SoC balancing strategy is
52.09 Ah, which is equivalent to 98.4% of the
macro-cell capacity.

Figure 14: OCV-based balancing method, (top)

measured voltages of the strongest and weakest cell
in macro-cell; (bottom) corresponding
activated/deactivated switches

It is obvious, that the OCV-based method

shows an improvement to the voltage-based
Figure 16: SoC-based balancing method, (top)
method. It is possible to remove a capacity of measured voltages of the strongest and weakest cell
48.42 Ah. The threshold of OCV difference is in macro-cell; (bottom) corresponding
set to 0.01V. activated/deactivated switches

5.3 Active balancing using SoC-based 5.4 Comparison between passive and active
algorithm balancing
In this verification tests the same driving cycle
Finally, the last strategy based on the SoC profile is applied four times to the battery to
balancing is applied. As the plot below shows,
Advanced Automotive Battery Conference (AABC), 04.-08.02.2013, Pasadena, California

Without Voltage- OCV-based SOC-based Unit

balancing based balancing balancing
balancing

LiFePO4: Qusable 43,32 46,02 48,42 52,09 Ah

Qusable/Qmax 81,63 86,9 91,4 98,4 %

NxMyCz: Qusable 43,14 49,48 52,07 51,92 Ah

Qusable/Qmax 81,47 93,43 98,32 98,01 %

Table 1: Summary of results in comparison to the passive balancing is

increased by 3.8%.
completely discharge the cells, but this time
three macro-cells in series are balanced. The

cells are fully charged at the beginning. A

dispersion of the capacities within the modules
was set to +/- 5%. For passive balancing, the
battery is discharged after 1.88h, usable
capacity is 51.41 Ah which is 96,6%, The
maximum state-of-charge difference between
most discharged cell and least discharge cell is
9.4%.
On the other side, for an active system the
result for the driving cycle profile is illustrated
in Figure 17. The battery is only complete
discharged after 2.05h, the usable capacity is Figure 18: Results of two-stage system applying
active balancing

Figure 17: Results of two-stage system applying
passive balancing
53.5 Ah and the maximum difference in state-
of-charge level between most discharged and
least discharged is 0.5%. The usable capacity
6. Conclusion
In this work different balancing algorithms
were implemented and compared using active
and passive systems. The voltage-based
method is the least complicated method to
implement and therefore state of the art
technique in electrical vehicles. However, this
method suffers in accuracy. The improvement
of this method is based on the OCV of the
individual cells. This implies the knowledge of
all internal resistances, which should not be a
challenge for intelligent BMS algorithms. The
best balancing method is based on the SoC
estimation of each cell. However, this method
is the most complex algorithm to implement as
well as high on computational cost.
Considering battery costs of 600€/kWh, 75€
for a passive and 115€ for an active system, the
profitability for a system reads as follows
Advanced Automotive Battery Conference (AABC), 04.-08.02.2013, Pasadena, California
Figure 19: Demarcation lines between passive and
active system
7. Acknowledgement
This work has been done in the framework of
the research project INGENEV funded by the
Ministry of Economic Affairs, Energy,
Building, Housing and Transport of the State
of North Rhine-Westphalia, Germany.
Responsibility for the content of this
publication lies within the authors.
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