Challenge: Low-Temperature Thermal Management for Parked Electric Vehicles

The Seeker, a major commercial vehicle manufacturer, is looking for disruptive technologies or systems to optimize battery thermal management in battery-powered electric vehicles (BEV), particularly those left stationary for many hours in very cold temperatures.

Electric car parked at the charging station. Image credit: Walter Baxter via Geograph.org.uk, CC BY-SA 2.0

Temperature highly affects the performance, safety, and lifetime of battery cells, making electric vehicles uncompetitive in large areas of the world thus denying these areas the benefits of reduced pollution and increased efficiency that come with the adoption of electric vehicles.

The Seeker desires novel solutions for the active thermal management of vehicle batteries for vehicles left parked for many hours in the cold while not plugged in or charging.

This Reduction-to-Practice Challenge requires written documentation and experimental proof-of-concept data, if available. Well-justified Theoretical solutions are acceptable for a partial award amount with the understanding the Seeker may laboratory test such solutions.

Overview

Anyone who has tried to start a car with an internal combustion engine in extremely cold weather understands the impact low temperature has on battery output. This impact is even more significant for battery powered electric vehicles (BEV), whose ability to move is directly related to the amount of power the batteries can provide at any given instant.

In discharge phase the current output available at the same state of charge (SoC) from a battery drops exponentially with dropping temperatures. For instance, battery output current at 15 °C is typically half of what it is at 25 °C, and at 0 °C it is one third of what it is at 15 °C.

This necessitates the warming of battery cells that are left at low temperatures before the vehicle can be used in order to lower their electrical resistance. This issue may impact the worldwide expansion of the use of electric vehicles, particularly into large areas of the world where extreme temperatures are common.

Currently, BEV typically have passive thermal management systems to keep the batteries warm or heat them from low temperatures. The Seeker is looking for a novel, energy efficient, active battery thermal management system (BTMS) that allows for fast, controlled heating of batteries to a specific temperature from any starting colder temperature.

Submissions to this Challenge must be received by 11:59 PM (US Eastern Time) on 24-Jul-2023.

Source: InnoCentive

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