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Secondary Life of Automotive Lithium Ion Batteries: An Aging and Economic Analysis

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2013, Master of Science, Ohio State University, Mechanical Engineering.
As electric vehicles continue to penetrate the automotive market, so too will an influx of used cells no longer suitable for vehicles but potentially prime for second use in grid storage applications. Since these cells may maintain a high percentage (70-80%) of the original capacity, they may also possess some economic value that could offset the current high cost of electric vehicles. This thesis studied the degradation of second use cells from automotive applications when continuing to be used on an anticipated electric grid cycle developed from existing economically ideal and real world. From this degradation, a simple economic analysis was performed. Though economic analysis has been performed previously, it was based on speculation of anticipated costs and degradation. This study however appears to be the first to estimate degradation rates from experimentation. The project began with the procurement of batteries which had reached automotive End of Life (EoL). Concurrently, aging profiles based on economically optimized models and actual regulation data from PJM were developed. These profiles were built so as to accurately simulate an anticipated year of use in a Community Energy Storage (CES) system. These profiles were then scaled to accelerate the aging process while maintaining total amp-hour throughput. In addition to this accelerated aging—which was done at anticipated ambient conditions for Columbus, Ohio—characterization assessment was performed before, during, and after aging via resistance and capacity testing. In-situ resistance measurements were also made during aging testing via carefully inserted resistance pulses within the aging profiles. This degradation information was post processed and then aggregated together to assess the overall rate of battery degradation. The in-situ tracking of resistance growth showed that such measurements are viable alternatives to otherwise intrusive resistance measurement testing, as a high number of samples properly processed can yield results with similar confidence to the more intrusive testing without the need to halt field operations. In addition to resistance growth tracking, the capacity degradation was also tracked and the data was used to predict the potential remaining life in the second use cells to determine their potential for storage on the grid and their economic value relative to new batteries. The experiment ultimately determined that under certain economic conditions, second use cells may prove a viable option for CES systems, this may frequently require an additional economic discount in addition to the proportion of their remaining capacity. As this work is the first of its kind, additional work should be done to more thoroughly assess the potential degradation of cells in a more narrow power (acceleration) range; ideally, 1-3x the rated capacity. In addition, work should be continued to determine the economic and practical viability of re-purposing used battery packs.
Yann Guezennec (Advisor)
Shawn Mildam-Mohler (Advisor)
114 p.

Recommended Citations

Citations

  • Warner, N. A. (2013). Secondary Life of Automotive Lithium Ion Batteries: An Aging and Economic Analysis [Master's thesis, Ohio State University]. OhioLINK Electronic Theses and Dissertations Center. http://rave.ohiolink.edu/etdc/view?acc_num=osu1366371336

    APA Style (7th edition)

  • Warner, Nicholas. Secondary Life of Automotive Lithium Ion Batteries: An Aging and Economic Analysis . 2013. Ohio State University, Master's thesis. OhioLINK Electronic Theses and Dissertations Center, http://rave.ohiolink.edu/etdc/view?acc_num=osu1366371336.

    MLA Style (8th edition)

  • Warner, Nicholas. "Secondary Life of Automotive Lithium Ion Batteries: An Aging and Economic Analysis ." Master's thesis, Ohio State University, 2013. http://rave.ohiolink.edu/etdc/view?acc_num=osu1366371336

    Chicago Manual of Style (17th edition)