Simulation study on thermal management system of battery module with dual bionic cold plate structure

This is the authors' abstract. We don't add key points for this paper.

The thermal safety of high-capacity lithium iron phosphate (LiFePO4) batteries becomes increasingly critical under normal-rate discharge conditions. Their optimal operating temperature window is merely 20–40°C, and the inter-cell temperature difference must be strictly maintained within 5°C. Inspired by the efficient transport characteristics of pine branches and the space-saving hexagonal architecture of honeycombs, this study proposes a novel Dual Bionic Cold Plate (DBCP). Four composite channel configurations (D1–D4) were designed and evaluated. Results indicate that the dual-inlet dual-outlet structure (D3) achieves the best cooling performance. Subsequently, the Box–Behnken Response Surface Methodology (RSM) was employed to optimize three critical geometric parameters: honeycomb block diameter, main/secondary channel width ratio, and number of main channels. The optimal configuration – block diameter of 15 mm, width ratio of 1.5, and four main channels – reduces the maximum temperature (Tmax) to 33.99°C and the temperature difference (ΔT) to 4.3°C under 25°C ambient and 1C discharge conditions (where 1C corresponds to a current that fully charges or discharges the cell in 1 hr). This study demonstrates that, compared with a conventional straight-flow cold plate of the same volume, the optimized dual-biomimetic composite cold plate (DBCP) reduces the maximum battery temperature by 0.98°C and decreases temperature non-uniformity by 22.65%. These results confirm that the dual-biomimetic composite structure effectively enhances heat dissipation efficiency and temperature uniformity, providing a practical reference for the thermal management of large-capacity lithium iron phosphate battery modules in electric vehicles.