ev battery cooling system Archives - Boyd | Trusted Innovation

Benefits of Battery Immersion Cooling for EV and Data Centers

Amanda — Tue, 08 Apr 2025 18:12:38 +0000

Beyond Conventional Cooling: Immersion Technology

Electric vehicles (EVs) and data centers demand advanced cooling solutions to maintain performance, safety, and longevity. EV batteries generate significant heat during charging and operation, which can shorten their lifespan and reduce efficiency. Meanwhile, data centers house high-performance computing systems require effective thermal management to handle increasing power densities and energy consumption. Conventional cooling techniques struggle to meet these escalating demands, driving the shift toward liquid cooling and immersion cooling. Explore how to leverage the advantages of immersion cooling, a revolutionary approach that delivers superior thermal control, efficiency, and reliability, powered by Boyd’s innovative liquid cooling technologies.

Immersion Cooling: Safety & Efficiency for EV Batteries

According to Exoes, immersion cooling improves battery cooling efficiency by up to four times compared to traditional air-cooling , enabling ultra-fast charging while enhancing battery safety and lifespan. This approach is beneficial for applications that require compact, high power density solutions, such as EV battery packs in extreme environments or high performing computing clusters in data centers. Some key advantages of immersion cooling include:

Efficient Heat Dissipation: Direct contact with a dielectric cooling fluid ensures uniform heat distribution, preventing hotspots and improving thermal efficiency.

Extended Battery Life: Stable operating temperatures reduce thermal stress on battery cells, slowing degradation and extending battery lifespan.

Improved Safety: Effective cooling minimizes the risk of thermal runaway, a leading cause of battery failures and fire hazards.

While immersion cooling offers an innovative solution for these specialized use cases, it complements liquid cooling by enhancing thermal performance in environments where direct submersion provides unique advantages, such as reducing dielectric barriers and simplifying thermal pathways.

Maximizing Data Center Efficiency with Immersion Cooling

As data centers push the limits of computational power, cooling efficiency becomes a top priority. According to a ScienceDirect study on immersion cooling efficiency, two-phase immersion cooling systems achieve a coefficient of performance up to 79% higher than single-phase systems, demonstrating their superior thermal management capabilities. Some key benefits of immersion cooling in data centers include:

Energy Efficiency: Directly cooling silicon devices with immersion-compatible heat sinks eliminates reliance on traditional air-cooling, significantly reducing energy consumption.

Space Optimization: Improved cooling efficiency allows data centers to house higher server densities without overheating concerns.

Noise Reduction: Removing traditional air-based cooling systems results in quieter operations, creating a more efficient and comfortable working environment.

Boyd: Engineered Components for Immersion Cooling Reliability

Boyd supports immersion cooling solutions for EVs and data centers by supplying precision-engineered components that enhance system reliability. For data centers, Boyd provides heat sinks for single phase and boiler plates for two-phase immersion cooling, along with Thermal Interface Materials (TIMs) that are compatible with different immersion fluids. In eMobility, Boyd ensures that compression pads and other battery materials remain compatible with immersion fluids. Boyd focuses on optimizing the materials and components that operate within immersion systems to maximize thermal performance and life.

Boyd: Focused Innovation in Immersion Cooling

Boyd advances immersion cooling by delivering critical thermal solutions designed for compatibility and performance. With expertise in advanced materials and thermal management, Boyd improves cooling efficiency in data centers and supports EV battery systems by validating material performance in immersion environments. By focusing on the components that matter most, Boyd ensures safety, reliability, and efficiency without compromising system integrity. Talk to Boyd’s experts today to develop a tailored immersion cooling solution for your application.

The post Benefits of Battery Immersion Cooling for EV and Data Centers appeared first on Boyd | Trusted Innovation.

Generative AI and EV Batteries: Why Liquid Cooling?

Boyd Blog — Thu, 13 Jul 2023 12:04:00 +0000

Generative AI and EV Batteries: Why Liquid Cooling?

Advancing technologies like high performance artificial intelligence (AI) and electric vehicle (EV) batteries use more power. More power generates more waste heat, so much that generative AI and EV battery innovators are shifting to liquid cooling. We’ll explore why liquid cooling is a fundamental part of this conversation.

Heat Capacity of Air versus Liquid

At the most basic level, liquid cooling has a higher capacity (Cp) to absorb heat than air cooling. Heat capacity measures how much energy (Joules) it takes to increase a mass (grams) to a specific temperature (Kelvin/Celsius). At room temperature:

Water absorbs 4 times as much energy as air to increase the same temperature.

Cp air = 1.0035 J/gK

Cp water = 4.1813 J/gK

Cp ethylene glycol = 2.36 J/gK

Cp propylene glycol = 2.5 J/gK

Higher heat capacity = more efficient, higher capacity cooling.

Density of Air versus Liquids

Liquids are much denser than air. Higher density means there is more liquid mass in a defined volume than there would be air mass. Comparing the density (ρ) of air versus water, water’s density is magnitudes higher than air.

Water has 829 times the mass of air in the same space! Another way to look at it, you would need 829 cm³ of air to weigh the same as 1 cm³ of water. That’s like a game dice weighing the same as 9 12-ounce aluminum cans.

Density Air = 0.001204 g/cm³

Density Water = 0.9982067 g/cm³

Greater density = more cooling capacity in a defined space.

Higher Heat Capacity and Density Work Together

Liquid cooling’s edge doesn’t come from its high heat capacity or density independently. Combining these two properties make liquid a powerful cooling solution.

Most applications are restricted by how much space is available for cooling. Here’s an example:
We’ll hold the volume constant to compare; Assume we have 100cm³ for simplicity.

In 100cm³, we can have either 0.12g of air or 99.8 g of water.
0.12g of air can absorb 0.12 Joules of energy before it increases 1 degree Celsius
99.8g of water can absorb 417 Joules of energy before it increases 1 degree Celsius

That’s over 3000 times more heat absorbed in the same volume.

Liquid absorbs more than 3000 times the heat from generative AI chips and EV batteries in the same space as air.

Why isn’t Liquid Cooling used for Everything?

Liquid cooling can cool more and faster than air but it comes with its own challenges. Air is easily available. Air only requires fans, blowers, ducting, or air baffling to control flow. Liquid is not readily and abundantly available everywhere. Liquid cooling requires tubes, manifolds, pumps, and fittings to circulate liquid. Liquid presents leak and water damage risk that is preventable with smart sensors, software, and system redundancies, but this adds to infrastructure complexity. High density also means liquid is more difficult to move compared to air. Liquid systems either move slower or require more powerful pumping systems.

Innovators in generative AI and EV batteries turn to liquid cooling when thermal demands surpass what is feasible with air cooling. The need for higher performance outweighs liquid’s additional system and infrastructure complexities.

Picking the Right Cooling System for your Application with Boyd

Boyd has decades of high reliability liquid cooling system field performance in regulated and high safety critical markets. We have dependably cooled high power loads by refining liquid system design to mitigate liquid cooling system challenges while maximizing its high cooling capacity benefits. Innovators in generative AI and EV batteries who are pushing their performance boundaries, and by default their thermal management system boundaries, are turning to Boyd for liquid cooling concepts, advanced component and system design, thermal simulation and modeling, cooling innovation, global manufacturing at scale, and 100% in-line leak testing.

Boyd is an invaluable liquid cooling partner with thermal management expertise across the whole air and liquid cooling spectrum to help push the limits of air-cooled solutions like 3D vapor chambers and remote heat pipe assemblies or safely introduce liquid systems with coolant distribution units, chillers, and liquid loops and cold plates. We’re cooling the most advanced generative AI and EV battery applications in the market today with advanced, high efficiency, dependable liquid cooling systems. Contact us to discover how we can help cool your AI and EV battery systems.

The post Generative AI and EV Batteries: Why Liquid Cooling? appeared first on Boyd | Trusted Innovation.

Electric Vehicle Batteries: Protecting Against Collision and Thermal Runaway

Boyd Blog — Mon, 07 Mar 2022 13:53:44 +0000

Battery charge range historically challenged consumer adoption of electric vehicles (EVs). But innovative EV designers have found creative ways to make drastic battery charge range improvements and the electric vehicle industry continues to grow at a rapid pace with EV adoption significantly increasing. Over the last ten years, some estimates suggest that average electric vehicle battery range has increased more than fourfold. This increase in power brings key thermal challenges. Increasing EV adoption elevates the need for more ruggedized EV battery designs to extend lifetime performance and control or reduce warranty claims.

Boyd’s innovative team of experts and design leaders are at the forefront of solving these challenges. We’re helping pioneers in this space accelerate innovation. Our engineers develop integrated thermal and engineered material solutions that enable smaller, ruggedized, lighter, more efficient, and more reliable batteries with faster charge cycles for greater electric vehicle range, safety, and reliability.

Thermal Runaway?

Lithium-Ion thermal runaway occurs when heat generated by a battery exceeds the amount of heat being dissipated. Unmanaged heat can cause an uncontrolled chain reaction to surrounding batteries and li-ion battery cells. When li-ion thermal runaway isn’t handled properly, batteries overheat produce smoke, and combust.

Multiple factors cause thermal runaway, some include internal and external short circuits, overcharging, high ambient temperatures, rapid cycling, and battery age. Effective thermal management is vital not only to an electric vehicle battery, but also to vehicle occupant safety.

How to Prevent Li-ion Thermal Runaway? Battery Thermal Runaway

Electric vehicle and battery manufacturers design preventive and containment strategies around EV battery thermal runaway. Thermal runaway prevention begins with optimized EV battery design. Thermal runaway protection is enhanced with specialty materials and components that reduce the probability of a thermal runaway event and protect against thermal runaway propagation if a catastrophic event were to occur. Li-ion battery cell-to-cell integrated cooling, heat isolating, and impact absorbing multi-layer complex assemblies protect against the thermal, environmental, and mechanical factors that cause battery thermal runaway. Proactively absorb impact, vibration and movement in the battery. Efficiently dissipate battery cell heat. Incorporate a flame or heat barrier in cell design to quickly isolate extreme heat or fire in the unlikely event battery safety design features fail to prevent cell-to-cell propagation. Leverage smart design to prevent thermal runaway and protective solutions to isolate catastrophic battery events when they happen. Integrated EV battery thermal runaway protection solutions feature cooling fins or heat spreaders with compression pads and flame-rated electrical insulation to isolate li-ion battery cells.

Need to Be Ruggedized?

Harsh environmental conditions are an everyday reality for electric vehicles. EV batteries and components need to be protected during operation to extend performance lifetime and reduce warranty claims. Ruggedized EV batteries can withstand and perform better against collision impact, ongoing shock and vibration, extreme road conditions, and extreme weather conditions.

How to Protect EV Batteries?

Sealing the EV battery enclosure protects the battery and cells against liquid, gas, and particulate intrusion to ensure long battery life. Leverage specialty materials and smart gasket design to both waterproof and seal EV battery housings, eliminate noise, vibration, and harshness (NVH), and optimize reliability and performance. Boyd’s EV battery housing seals are designed for simplified customer assembly, design for manufacturing (DFM) throughput, material optimization, and are ruggedized to withstand harsh road conditions over the life of the vehicle.

Battery Cell and Battery Module

Protect EV batteries against collision impact, harsh road conditions, and temperature extremes with rugged, resilient compression pads. Battery compression pads layer between battery cells and around the battery module to compensate for swelling forces and mechanical shock, friction, and extreme road vibration. They act as a battery impact protection barrier to enhance consumer safety and reduce battery-related warranty costs. Boyd’s wide variety of closed and open cell foam options are highly resilient and meet the needs of many different temperature and environmental exposure applications.

Design Shields Around the Battery Module

Improve battery performance, safety, and reliability with EMI and RFI shielding. EMI Shielding prevents both the input and output of radiofrequency interference (RFI), electrostatic interference (ESD), or electromagnetic interference (EMI), all of which are highly prevalent in complex electrical systems in electric vehicles. EV battery EMI shields protect battery performance and prevent electronic malfunction in critical safety systems. Boyd’s conductive foams, elastomers, adhesives, foils, and more are designed to mitigate this interference and shield unwanted signals, improving reliability and efficiency in EV batteries.

Wrap EV Battery Cells with Electrical Insulation

Wrap li-ion battery cells and EV battery modules with high performance electrical insulators. These rugged insulation layers prevent spark voltage between internal critical components that can lead to battery shorting or fire. They also isolate and act as flame barriers in the unlikely scenario of a catastrophic event. Boyd’s electrical insulators and isolators are flame rated up to FR V0, helping you proactively design to prevent electrical EV battery fires from occurring, or to isolate li-ion battery cells if they combust.

Dielectric Adhesives on Busbars

Protect flexible, printed circuits in EV battery assemblies to extend battery lifetime and maintain performance. Dielectric adhesives electrically insulate busbars with high heat resistance and flame protection. Busbars feature precision designs and dielectric adhesives must be converted with tight tolerances for precision through-hole placement. Boyd’s dielectric materials and adhesives are tested for breakdown voltage and dielectric strength requirements using GB/T 1408.1-2016 and ASTM D3755 test methods.

How to Maximize Electric Vehicle Battery Power Efficiency and Performance?

Leverage Lightweight, High Performance EV Battery Liquid Cold Plates

EV battery cooling solutions must meet heat challenges and overall design requirements but cannot add weight or bulk to preserve EV battery charge range. Lightweight battery liquid cold plates provide Robust Structural Support (RSS) and maximize battery heat removal for today’s highest performing electric vehicle battery modules and packs. Low-profile cooling plates efficiently cool batteries and create extra design space in the battery compartment, making room for larger, more powerful batteries.

Boyd’s custom EV battery cold plates optimize internal geometry to maximize turbulent flow and external geometry with skylines and pedestals customized to your battery design to maximize heat source contact and thermal dissipation. Boyd’s battery liquid cooling plates have one hundred percent in-line thermal testing and decades of trusted market performance to assure reliability.

Minimize Thermal Resistance with Thermal Interface Material

Improve heat transfer between the battery cold plate and battery module by minimizing thermal resistance between these two surfaces. Thermal Interface Materials (TIMs) minimize heat flow resistance between surfaces, more efficiently moving heat away from sensitive EV batteries into the liquid cooling system through the battery cooling plate.

Boyd’s thermally conductive tapes, gap fillers, thermal pads, films, phase change materials, and thermal grease maximize battery liquid cooling system performance by more efficiently moving heat from the battery to the liquid cold plate.

Whether it’s protecting and cooling EV batteries, creating smart displays and telematics, optimizing EV charging, elevating EV brand identity, and more, Boyd helps eMobility designers and market leaders accelerate innovation. For more information about Boyd’s EV battery solutions, watch our video below. For specific questions about your application, reach out to our experts.

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