Performance comparison between single S-channel and double S-channel cold plate for thermal management of a prismatic LiFePO4 battery

As the cold plate is the most important component of liquid-cooled battery thermal management system, in this work, a double S-channel cold plate is designed and used for cooling a prismatic LiFePO 4 battery. The maximum temperature, temperature difference and pressure drop of the single S-channel cold plate and the double S-channel cold plate is numerically investigated and compared under different conditions. It is found that the maximum temperature of the battery with a double S-channel cold plate is close to that with a single S-channel cold plate. The temperature difference of the battery with a double S-channel cold plate is lower than that with a single S-channel cold plate. The pressure drop and pumping power of the double S-channel cold plate are reduced by 73.88% compared with the single S-channel cold plate. Furthermore, the overall thermal performance evaluation criterion (PEC) is employed to evaluate the performance of the cold plate in terms of heat transfer and flow resistance. Results show that the performance of the double S-channel cold plate is better than that of the single S-channel cold plate. Overall, this work shows that the double S-channel cold plate is more applicable in the battery thermal management system.