Smart manufacturing has intersected with macro trends like sustainability and electrification, delivering solutions that improve performance while providing sustainability wins for businesses. And as electrification permeates more and more markets, smart manufacturing can optimize the battery's performance. This feature is especially relevant given the high fraction of the battery's product cost.
The first step toward implementing smart manufacturing is collecting the large amount of data needed for the AI to analyze. Because of how essential sensors are to smart manufacturing (and the IoT more broadly), the global sensor market projects to grow from $199.5 billion in 2021 to nearly $410 billion by 2029 at a CAGR of 9.4 percent between 2022-2029.
While sensors help manufacture the vehicles and applications in which batteries are used, they can also be used to improve the battery's performance. And as batteries account for 30-40 percent of the cost of an EV, optimizing the battery's performance helps strengthen its durability, extending battery life and reducing the total cost of ownership.
This article reviews several sensor trends and innovations and how each helps to optimize battery performance.
Enhanced Battery Status to Extend Its Lifetime
Measuring an accurate picture of the battery status is critical to determine whether it is performing well or whether the control system should intervene. For example, lithium-ion (Li-ion) batteries operate most efficiently at temperatures between 15-35°C, a range that promotes electrochemistry reaction rates without causing degradation. However, fast charging pushes battery temperatures upward, elevating temperatures past 35°C, which increases passenger safety risk and can reduce battery life.
Current Sensing Modules
Many advanced battery systems, like EVs, employ battery thermal management systems (BTMS) to regulate the cell temperature. Continental's current sensing modules (CMS) can measure the temperature and current as inputs to the BTMS, allowing it to respond rapidly to undesirable operating conditions. This near-instant reaction by the BTMS optimizes performance to maximize range and proactively guards against passenger safety issues.
Battery Impact Detection
Another sensor application that provides insight into battery status is battery impact detection (BID). Also, from Continental, BID uses two pressure sensors to measure shock waves the vehicle experiences to determine the severity and location of an impact. The BID uses the same sensor technology applied to vehicle bumpers to detect a collision, extending the utility of an existing sensor design. The impact detection isolates the battery following a failure.
Quantum Sensors
Along with the durability mentioned above, several additional limitations of commercially available large batteries are low energy density and safety due to thermal runaway. In addition, EVs require large battery packs with substantial power storage capacity, creating an opportunity for quantum sensors.
These devices complement existing battery monitoring systems (that measure the amount of remaining charge) to give engineers a view of how the battery current is flowing. In addition, a project from the University of Sussex aims to implement quantum magnetometer technology to assess the chemistries of various battery types, enabling this comparison to determine the most optimal technologies.
Conclusion and Future Applications
As electrification continues transitioning from niche sustainability play to broad climate and cost improvement asset, batteries quickly emerge as the limiting technology in its success. And while the chemistry itself is advancing, protecting the battery is paramount to reducing charging cycles and extending battery lifetime. Fewer charges minimize energy demand, delivering immediate sustainability improvement. In addition, improving durability saves repair or replacement costs along with delaying or avoiding the need to recycle or dispose of a battery.
Meanwhile, engineers continue to develop and implement sensors, the lifeblood of the IoT, to collect and transmit massive amounts of data essential to delivering transformative improvements. For example, these devices can assess the remaining charge life, measure how the current travels through the battery, determine how hot the battery is getting during operation and stop discharge in the event of a crash. These improvements ensure the battery operates at its peak performance level, maximizing efficiency. In addition, gaining increased visibility into battery performance levels enables predictive maintenance, a vital quality measure that alerts an operator when a repair will likely be needed before the component fails.
The EV market and IoT have realized the power and robustness of sensors and how much they can accelerate product performance and durability optimizations, sustainability and safety.
Several current battery sensor developments include devices that more accurately read and communicate when the charge current drops following fast-charging to 80 percent capacity and improvements to the accuracy of electric vehicle range estimation and predicted durability.
Sensors are vital to optimizing the performance of batteries and can deliver sustainability while extending the battery's lifetime in the process.
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