Experimental Investigation of Heat Transfer Characteristics of Battery Management System and Electronic Control Unit of Neighborhood Electric Vehicle

The increased need for mobility has necessitated a tremendous growth in transportation industry. The consumption of oil has increased many-fold leading to rapid deterioration of fossil fuel resources and increased greenhouse gas emissions. This has led to the finding alternative source of energy for vehicles in terms of battery based electric vehicles. Although electric vehicles are promising option for transportation, many issues like specific power, cost, vehicle range, battery thermal management etc. needs to be resolved efficiently in order to compete with internal combustion engine based vehicles. In this paper, an experimental study has been carried out to investigate the heat transfer characteristics of battery thermal management system and electronic control unit of neighborhood electric vehicle. The temperatures are measured at critical locations with varying velocity and varying altitude.