Experiments were conducted on the operating characteristics and performance of various types of working fluid, filling amount and heat flow rate of a loop thermosyphon for cooling ESS battery container. As results of performance test on various working fluids, HFE-7100 and R-134a as a working fluids showed unstable operating and low performance due to vapor pressure drop, and performance was improved by increasing the number of vapor lines for reducing a pressure drop. In this study, n-pentane was more stable and showed better thermal performance among various working fluids.

A three dimensional numerical analysis was performed to study the cooling performance of xEV battery module depending on cooling fluid inlet position. Depending on the inlet position from the top, case 1 (top inlet), case 2 (middle inlet), and case 3 (bottom inlet) are selected. For the case 1, the temperature of the battery near inlet was higher than that of the battery near outlet. For the case 2 and 3 the temperature of the battery near inlet was lower than that of the battery near outlet. From the analysis result, the cooling performance is higher in the order of case 2, case 3, and case 1.

The temperature distribution of a generic battery module was analyzed for different flow rates of cooling fluid. For the given battery module design, the temperature of battery cell near the inlet is higher than that of battery cell near the outlet. Because the inlet is located at the higher elevation than the top of battery electrodes, most of the incoming cooling fluid flows directly towards the battery housing wall above the outlet. For the inlet velocities of 1, 3, 5 m/s, the maximum temperature differences are 28, 19, 15 degrees Celcius respectively.