Temperature Distribution on Lithium-ion Polymer

Battery Cell: Experiment and Modeling

Yiqun Liu Y. Gene Liao Ming-Chia Lai
College of Engineering College of Engineering College of Engineering
Wayne State University Wayne State University Wayne State University
Detroit, USA Detroit, USA Detroit, USA
yiqun.liu@wayne.edu geneliao@wayne.edu lai@eng.wayne.edu

Abstract—The performance of the lithium-ion battery is highly
dependent on the operating temperature. In order to keep the
operating temperature within the optimal range, a thermal
management system (TMS) is used to cool down or warm up the
battery. Understanding the heat generation characteristics and
temperature distribution of the lithium-ion batteries is essential to
design an effective TMS. In this paper, the surface temperature
distribution over a 20Ah lithium-ion polymer battery cell is
measured under different charging and discharging conditions. A
cell thermal model is then built using the ANSYS Fluent. The
simulation results are correlated and validated well with the
experimental data. The validated cell thermal model provides a
design guideline to thermal management system in the level of
battery module and pack.
Keywords - battery heat, battery temperature, battery thermal
management, lithium-ion battery.
I. INTRODUCTION
Lithium-ion batteries have been widely used as the electric
energy storage devices in many configurations of hybrid and
electric vehicles. The lithium-ion battery is also a good
candidate to replace the traditional lead-acid Starting, Lighting,
and Ignition (SLI) battery [1]. High energy-to-weight ratio, high
energy-to-volume ratio, and excellent cycle life make the
lithium-ion battery suitable for vehicle applications [2].
However, the operating temperature has a significant impact on
the performance, safety, and cycle lifetime of the lithium-ion
batteries. The typically acceptable operating temperature region
for lithium-ion batteries is between −20°C and 60°C, while an
optimal temperature range is from 15°C to 35°C. Furthermore,
the maximum temperature difference from cell to cell in a
module should not exceed 5°C to avoid severe temperature
gradient. The battery usable capacity and discharging voltage
are decreased under low operating temperature. The cycle life of
the battery is shortened under high operating temperature. Some
safety issues might be initiated under high operating temperature.
To maintain the operating temperature in the optimal range, a
thermal management system (TMS) is used to cool down or
warm up the battery. Understanding the heat generation
characteristics and temperature distribution of the lithium-ion
batteries is important to design the effective TMS.
Many researches have been done to investigate the heat
generation and temperature distribution of the lithium-ion
battery cells. A general thermal model based on the energy
balance for battery systems was firstly proposed by Bernardi et
al. [3]. In their model, the battery cell temperature is the result
of the interaction of the Joule heat, phase-change heat, heat of
mixing, and heat from the electrochemical reaction with the
component-dependent open-circuit potentials. To calculate the
heat generation rate, the temperature distribution is considered
to be uniform throughout and dependent on time. Dong and
Baek [4] analyzed the thermal behavior of the lithium-ion
battery using a thermal model proposed by Bernardi et al. [3].
They found that the battery heat generation is dominated by the
irreversible Joule heat during high-rate discharge, and the bulk
of heat during low-rate discharge is mainly caused by the
reversible entropic heat from electrochemical reactions. Sato [5]
and Lai et al. [6] considered electrochemical reaction heat,
polarization heat, and Joule heat as the heat generation sources
in the lithium-ion battery. The amount of the heat generated was
attributed from each heat. The variation of the irreversible and
reversible heat generation as a function of the Depth Of
Discharge (DOD) was also analyzed. A thermal model for a
pouch lithium-ion battery was developed by Yildiz et al. [7].
Their model only accounts for the irreversible Joule heat. The
simulated temperature data matches the experimental data well.
The heat generation rate under constant current discharge
conditions can be calculated by using this simplified model. In
conclusion, most battery thermal models consider the Joule heat
and the heat from the electrochemical reactions as the major
source of the heat generation in the battery.
Many on-the-shelf software, such as ANSYS Fluent,
COMSOL, MATLAB/Simulink, can be utilized to simulate the
thermal effect on the lithium-ion batteries. Samba et al. [8] used
ANSYS Fluent to develop an advanced two-dimensional
thermal model for large size lithium-ion pouch cells and analyze
the cell temperature distribution over the surface. Parsons and

978-1-7281-1220-6/19/$31.00 ©2019 IEEE

Mackin [9] used ANSYS Fluent to simulate the transient thermal
response of a 15-cell, 48V lithium-ion battery pack. They used
the model to design and simulate the passive thermal
management system for the lithium-ion battery packs in an
unmanned ground vehicle. Cai and White [10] used COMSOL
multiphysics software to build the mathematical model of the
lithium-ion battery with thermal effects. They used this model
to investigate the thermal behavior of a lithium-ion battery
during the galvanostatic discharge process with and without a
pulse. Zhang et al. [11] built a large-format laminated lithium-
ion batteries thermal model in COMSOL and compared the
simulated results with experimental data. Wu et al. [12] used
MATLAB/Simulink to solve the coupled thermal-
electrochemical model of uneven heat generation in lithium-ion
battery packs.
This paper presents the modeling, simulation, and
experimental validation of the surface temperature distribution
on a Lithium-Nickel-Manganese-Cobalt-Oxide (LiNiMnCoO2)
based cell with 3.6V nominal voltage and 20Ah capacity. The
surface temperature distribution is measured under different
charging and discharging conditions. The battery cell thermal
model is built in the ANSYS Fluent environment. The
simulation results are correlated and validated with the
experimental data. The validated cell thermal model could
provide a design guideline to thermal management system in the
level of battery module and pack.
II. EXPERIMENT PROCEDURES
The lithium-ion polymer battery cell used in this experiment
is the 20Ah ePLB-C020 cell with 3.6V nominal voltage. The
fully charged voltage is 4.2V and the fully discharged voltage is
set to 2.5V. The following procedures are conducted to measure
the temperature distribution on the battery cell surface.
1. Eight OMEGA surface thermocouples with self-adhesive
backing (model number: SA1-K-SRTC) are attached to eight
locations (Location #1 to #8) on the battery cell surface. The
thermocouples are connected to the two TEKCOPLUS 4-
channel K-type thermocouple meter (model number: THTK-
6). Inside the temperature chamber, the battery cell is
supported on a frame and cell tabs are connected to two cycler
cables, as shown in Fig. 1.
Fig. 1. Locations of eight thermocouples on battery cell surface
2. The cell is charged to full charge at 4.2V using 20A. Once the
charging voltage reaches 4.2V, the temperature chamber is on
and the inside temperature is set to 25˚C. After the charging
voltage reaches 4.2V, the cycler uses smaller charging current
to keep the cell voltage at 4.2V.
3. After the temperature readings on the thermocouple meters
become stable at about 27˚C, a 20A constant current
discharging process is started. The temperature data on all
eight locations are recorded every 30 seconds.
4. Steps 2 and 3 are repeated for 40A, 60A, and 80A discharging.
5. In each discharging process, the temperature chamber is set to
25˚C when the voltage reaches 2.5V. After the discharging
voltage reaches 2.5V, the cycler uses a smaller discharging
current to keep the cell voltage at 2.5V.
6. After the temperature readings on the thermocouple meters
become stabile around 27˚C, start the 20A charging process is
started. The temperature data on all eight locations are
recorded every 30 seconds. And repeat steps 5 and 6 for 40A
charging test.
III. TEST RESULTS
It is clearly to show that surface temperature on the battery
cell increases during discharging process. In the 20A constant
current discharging test, the surface temperatures (at all
locations) are almost stable before 50% DOD and increase about
1 degree before the end of the test. For the 40A, 60A, and 80A
discharging tests, the temperatures increase rapidly at the
beginning and the end of the tests, while slowly increase from
40% to 70% DOD. The increments of surface temperature
become larger with the increase of discharging current. The
largest temperature increment for one single location is 2˚C in
20A discharging test, 10˚C in 40A discharging test, 13˚C in 60A
discharging test, and 20˚C in 80A discharging test.
During each test, the largest temperature difference
consistently presents at the end of the discharging. This
phenomenon occurs at all locations and the difference increases
as the discharging current increases. The largest temperature
difference is 1˚C for 20A discharging test, 4˚C for 40A and 60A
discharging test, and 5.5˚C for 80A discharging test. For the 20A
and 40A charging tests, the surface temperatures stop increasing
and become stable at the end of charging processes. The largest
temperature gradient among eight locations is 0.5˚C in 20A
charging test, an 1.6˚C in 40A charging test. During all charging
and discharging tests, Locations #1, #2, and #3 mostly have
higher surface temperatures than others. Location #8 almost has
lowest surface temperatures. It can be seen that the area close to
the positive and negative tabs has always has higher temperature.

Fig. 2. Surface temperature variation under different charge / discharge condition
IV. CELL THERMAL MODELING
The heat generation and temperature distribution of the
battery cell are simulated in the ANSYS Fluent. The simulation
model used is the NTGK (Newman, Tiedemann, Gu, and Kim)
Empirical Model which is a semi-empirical electrochemical
model. NTGK model was proposed by Kwon [13] and has been
used and validated by Kim et al. [14, 15]. Equation 1 is formed
in the model and the current transfer is related to the potential
field.
𝑗 = 𝑎𝑌[𝑈 − (𝜑+ − 𝜑− )]
where 𝑎 denotes the specific area of the electrode sandwich
sheet, 𝜑+ and 𝜑− are phase potentials for the positive and
negative electrodes, Y and U are the parameters of the model and
can be determined by the DOD:
𝑉𝑜𝑙 𝑡 6. Under Boundary Conditions, edit the thermal properties for
𝐷𝑂𝐷 = (∫0 𝑗𝑑𝑡)
3600𝑄𝐴ℎ
where Vol is the volume of the battery and 𝑄𝐴ℎ is the total
capacity in Ah of the battery. For a certain battery, the Y and U
values can be determined by the curve fitting of the voltage-
current response curve from the testing. Based on the work of
Kwon [13], Equation 3 and 4 are used in this model to determine
Y and U.
1 1
𝑌 = (∑5𝑛=0 𝑎𝑛 (𝐷𝑂𝐷)𝑛 )exp [−𝐶1 ( −
𝑇 𝑇𝑟𝑒𝑓
𝑈 = (∑3𝑛=0 𝑏𝑛 (𝐷𝑂𝐷)𝑛 ) − 𝐶2 (𝑇 − 𝑇𝑟𝑒𝑓 )
where 𝐶1 and 𝐶2 are the constants of the NTGK model, 𝑎𝑛 and
𝑏𝑛 are the coefficients used to determine U and Y in Gu’s work
[16], T is the current temperature, and 𝑇𝑟𝑒𝑓 is the reference
temperature (298K).
Equation 5 shows energy sources consisting of the Joule
heating, electrochemical reaction heating, and entropic heating:
𝑑𝑈
𝑞̇ = 𝜎+ 𝛻 2 𝜑+ + 𝜎− 𝛻 2 𝜑− + 𝑗 [𝑈 − (𝜑+ − 𝜑− ) − 𝑇 ] (5)
𝑑𝑇
where 𝜎+ and 𝜎− are the effective electric conductivities for the
positive and negative electrodes.
The following steps are followed to setup the simulation
model:
1. In the DesignModeler, a 3D model of the battery cell is
created based on the actual size of the ePLB-C020 cell used
in the experiment. The length, width, and thickness of the
cell are 196mm, 127mm, and 7mm, respectively. Both
positive and negative tabs are 30mm by 23mm, and the
thickness of both tabs are 2mm.
2. In Mesh, the mesh of the geometry of the battery cell is
created. There are 234,322 nodes and 204,656 elements in
the mesh.
3. The mesh file is imported to the Fluent Setup. The Energy
and MSMD Battery Model are turned on. Considering the
tradeoff between accuracy and complexity of all models, the
NTGK Empirical Model is used because it is a simple semi-
empirical electrochemical model. The 20Ah is entered for
the Nominal Cell Capacity. Specified C-rate is selected as
the Solution Option. Different C-rates are entered for
different tests. Min. and Max. Stop Voltages are set to 2.5V
and 4.2V respectively.
4. Under Model Parameters, 0 is entered for Initial DOD for
discharging simulation and 1 is entered for Initial DOD for
charging simulation. All the U Coefficients and Y
Coefficients are determined by the method provided in [14].
Assign the active components, tab components, negative tab,
and positive tab under Conductive Zones and Electric
Contacts.
5. Under Materials, copper is used as the tab material. For the
active material inside the battery cell, density is set to 2092
(1) kg/m3, specific heat is set to 678 J/kg-K, thermal
conductivity is set to 18.4 W/m-K, electrical conductivity is
set to 3.541e+7 siemens/m. The User Defined Scalar
Diffusion Coefficients are set to 1190,000 kg/m-s and
983,000 kg/m-s for uds-0 and uds-1 respectively based on
the ANSYS battery simulation tutorial.
(2) all battery cell walls and positive / negative tabs. Select
convection as the Thermal Condition. Set the heat transfer
coefficient as 8 W/m2-K, and set the free stream temperature
to 298K, same as the testing temperature inside the
temperature chamber (25 degree Celsius). Assign the
materials to different zones.
7. Use SIMPLE as the scheme under Solution Methods. Use
Hybrid as the Initialization Method. Under Run Calculation,
use fixed time stepping method. Set Time Step Size to 60
)] (3) seconds. Set the Number of Time Steps according to the
different testing C-Rates.
(4)
Figure 3 is the temperature contour plots generated by the
ANSYS Fluent. In each charging or discharging simulation, two
contour plots are captured. One contour plot is taken at the
midpoint of the charging or discharging process and the other
contour plot is taken at the endpoint of the charging or
discharging process. At the beginning of each simulation
process, the surface temperature of the cell is uniform and is at
298.15 K. From these plots, it can be seen that the area close to
the positive and negative tabs always has higher temperature.
Also, the temperature increasement increases with the increase
of charging or discharging current. The temperature variation
throughout the cell surface also increases when the charging or
discharging current increases.
V. VALIDATION OF THE SIMULATION RESULTS
To validate the simulation results, the experimental
temperature data of eight locations at midpoint and endpoint of
each charge or discharge test process are used. The simulation
results are compared with the experimental results and
summarized in the Table I. The numbers in the “DIF” columns
are calculated from simulation temperatures minus experimental
temperatures. The negative value means the simulation
20A charging
40A charging
20A discharging
Fig. 3. Simulation results of the temperature distribution on cell surface
temperature is lower than the experimental temperature and the
positive value means the simulation value is higher than the
experimental temperature. As shown in the table, most
temperature differences between the simulation and experiment
are smaller than 2 degree. In the 60A and 80A discharging
processes, the simulation temperatures are always higher than
the experimental results. This might be due to the pouch case
material of the battery cell. The temperature is measured on the
outside surface of the cell pouch case in the experiments.
However, the simulated temperature is calculated on the active
material inside the cell, which has higher temperature than the
outside surface of the cell. The temperature differences between
the simulation and experiment increase as the charging and
discharging current increases. The average temperature
difference between the simulation and experiment during 80A
discharging process is 2.5 degrees.
40A discharging
60A discharging
80A discharging
 Table I. Temperature (K) comparison between simulation and experiment

VI. CONCLUSION
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This work was supported in part by the National Science [13] K. H. Kwon et al. “A Two-dimensional Modeling of a Lithium-polymer
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