Design software simulates battery operation

The BDS environment gives users a faster battery-design process and provides a standard platform connecting material suppliers, cell designers and battery users.

CD-Adapco has partnered with Battery Design LLC, a company with more than 10 years experience with the development of lithium-ion (Li-ion) battery analysis software and cell design consulting. The two firms have developed a way to design and analyze Li-ion battery cells, modules, and pack installations. This new battery design software lets users migrate from short length scale simulations, such as studies of a detailed single cell, to complex battery modules, packs or complete installations, including multiple hundreds of battery cells and their surrounding structure and cooling system. The same battery performance model, currently a range of three, can be used in any of the different length scale models. This removes need for duplicating or simplifying the engineering tasks, thereby facilitating the division of labor:

one engineer, probably part of the cell team, creates a battery cell model and begins running cell level simulations. This model can then be passed to another analyst, maybe working in the application team, who uses it to create complex simulations of battery modules or packs. This process ensures that there is no duplication in the two engineers’ time while providing a high fidelity numerical model and coupled flow, thermal, and electrochemical solution.

The software can compute the thermal and electrical or electrochemical solution within one code and ensure that all phenomena are included to achieve a correct overall performance.

The Battery Simulation Module (BSM) combines an electrochemical solver with flow and thermal solvers. These can calculate the 3D thermal, fluid, and electrochemical properties of lithium-ion battery cells on several length scales, starting from each finite volume/e-cell within a battery cell, to the entire pack, including thermally-conducting parts such as metallic connectors at high discharge/charge rate. This is achieved through a closely coupled 3D simulation which returns the electrochemical and thermal properties as complex distributions over the electrodes and battery cells. The internal construction of each cell is taken into account without need to resolve all layers independently, balancing computation effort with appropriate detail.

Battery Design Studio (BDS) was developed to provide a simulation environment for the analysis and design of the electrochemical system and detailed geometry of a single battery cell. A choice of three battery performance models is offered to users, enhanced with significant developments relevant to contemporary cell design, such as multiple active materials or particle sizes.

The software provides a complete battery definition including all geometric details of the cell, details of the collector technology, number of electrodes, and a relevant numerical model of the battery’s performance under load. The model is then tested under appropriate discharge and thermal conditions. This rapidly confirms the correct behaviour of the electrical model which can then be used to study the cell response to load and to understand its limiting factors.

CD Adapco
www.cd-adapco.com