Modeling Li-Ion Battery Thermal Runaway Using a Three Section Thermal Model

This paper presents a model describing lithium-ion battery thermal runaway triggered by an internal short. The model predicts temperature and heat generation from the internal short circuit and side reactions using a three-section model. The three sections correspond to the core, middle, and surface layers. At each layer, the temperature-dependent heat release and progression of the three major side reactions are modeled. A thermal runaway test was conducted on a 4.5 Ah nickel manganese cobalt oxide pouch cell, and the temperature measurements are used for model validation. The proposed reduced order model based on three sections can balance the computational speed with the model complexity required to predict the fast core temperature evolution and slower surface temperature growth. The model shows good agreement with the experimental data, and it will be further improved with formal tuning in a follow-up effort to enable early detection of thermal runway induced by internal short.