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Procedia Engineering 129 (2015) 213 – 218

International Conference on Industrial Engineering

Algorithms of LiFePO4 batteries automatic charge

Solomin E.V.a*, Topolsky D.V.a, Toposkaya I.Ga
a
South Ural State University, 76, Lenin Avenue, Chelyabinsk, 454080, Russian Federation

Abstract

A wide variety of rapidly evolving algorithms of lithium-ion battery charge leads to the lack of statistics on the differential
coefficient of a specific battery degradation, or in other words, a misunderstanding of the difference in the state of charge after
several charge-discharge cycles as compared to a single one. As a solution of the problem the authors propose the usage of a
universal integrated algorithm of LiFePO4 batteries charging with initial and final trickle charge, which will both train the battery
and reduce the differential coefficient of degradation, as well as allow testing of local grid power which the battery is charging
from. This approach, if distributed widely, may give rich statistic information to be used for further improvement of charge
algorithms.
© 2015
© 2015TheTheAuthors.
Authors.Published
Publishedby by Elsevier
Elsevier Ltd.Ltd.
This is an open access article under the CC BY-NC-ND license
Peer-review under responsibility of the organizing committee of the International Conference on Industrial Engineering (ICIE-
(http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc-nd/4.0/).
2015).
Peer-review under responsibility of the organizing committee of the International Conference on Industrial Engineering (ICIE-2015)

Keywords: lithium-ion battery, accumulating battery, charge-discharge, differential coefficient of battery degradation, LiFePO4, state of charge

1. Application of Trickle Charge in LiFePO4 batteries

Our earlier published materials on the development of charging algorithms for lithium-ion batteries intended for
the heavy load electric vehicles and city transportation, had caused a living feedback in the part of optional trickle
charge [1]. The reason of variances is the proposed universality of charging algorithm.
In particular a lot of lithium-ion batteries used earlier, were dangerously explosive [2]. This type of batteries is the
electrochemical device using chemical reactions, leading in some cases to the internal short circuits caused by
overheating. That was actually the main reason of their failure. During a few milliseconds the chain reaction of

* Corresponding author. Tel.: +7 912 317 1805; fax: +7 912 3171 1805.
E-mail address: nii-uralmet@mail.ru

1877-7058 © 2015 The Authors. Published by Elsevier Ltd. This is an open access article under the CC BY-NC-ND license
(http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc-nd/4.0/).
Peer-review under responsibility of the organizing committee of the International Conference on Industrial Engineering (ICIE-2015)
doi:10.1016/j.proeng.2015.12.035
214 E.V. Solomin et al. / Procedia Engineering 129 (2015) 213 – 218

“dominoes” type leads in specific conditions to the explosive effect. One of the ways of reliable defense was the use
of copper jumpers between electrodes in battery, melting when the temperature exceeds 10000C, which leads to the
chain breakup.
We carefully studied this type of batteries for the application of trickle charge. In the algorithms proposed in [1],
there was no any data about the type of battery or temperature control and thermal chain/charge disconnection.
Nevertheless this research was actually in mind during the scientific experiments planned step by step in the iterative
sequence “problem study – analysis and generalization – heuristic approaches and hypotheses – experiment
verification”.

2. Advantages and Disadvantages of Trickle Charge

Trickle charge proposed in some cases for charging the Li-ion battery after it is fully charged (i.e. 95-99% from
the initial state of charge), in most cases can be dangerous because in accordance with manuals, the batteries of this
type cannot consume energy when overcharged, and can be damaged. And vice versa, the lack of trickle charge leads
first to the progressive steadfast aging (degradation) of battery because of partly not full charged, and second to the
non-efficient usage of the battery. Thus the “golden mean” is required, and the problem could be solved by adding
the temperature feedback into the charging algorithm. This entry would help to avoid the overheating, switching to
the trickle charge in time, and even during the trickle charge stage would help to control the battery state of charge,
and therefore to prolong its life from charge to charge. Today a lot of equipment for batteries trickle charge, is
available on the market. However there is no available accurate data about the time of charge and thermal features
for specific batteries and in particular about the impulses duty factors, excluding the only [14].
It is necessary to note that as a rule there is no any information about trickle charge even in manual
documentation on the batteries, which causes some apprehensions in the usage of trickle charge in general, moreover
in automatic duties. However due to the research of lithium-ion batteries’ structure and the results of long term
testing [4,5], we can make a conclusion that the main charge could be applied without trickle charge [15-21]. But in
this case every charge will slowly be aging the battery as the memory effect is also presented in this type of batteries
according to the research of [5], in analog with nickel-cadmium and nickel-metal-hydride batteries. Thus lithium-ion
batteries are liable for degradation and the charging processes require exclusively important attention.
Degradation of LiFePO4 batteries is caused by the fact that the electrode material consists of multitude minute
micrometer size particles which charge and discharge individually one after another. This model of charge-discharge
is known as a “multi-element model” [6]. During the charging process the lithium ions are being released. Fully
charged particle becomes free of lithium presenting the phosphate ion FePO4. Discharge is vice versa returns lithium
ions back and phosphate ion becomes a lithium-phosphate ion LiFePO4. The difference between the number of
lithium ions repeatedly interacting with phosphate ions, reflects the battery voltage reduction. In this case this
difference represents the specific battery differential coefficient of degradation which has a non-linear aging
characteristic known as a dependence of SOC (state of charge) on different charging currents varying from 0.1C to
10C. Thus the difference in the number of ions leads to some critical results which in turn lead to the reduction of
chemical potential [22].

3. Individuality of Battery Differential Coefficient

In accordance with the above mentioned arguments each charge-discharge cycle of lithium-ion battery leads to
some its degradation, the differential coefficient of which is individual not only for different types of batteries, but
for the products of the same type because of different structure of materials [23,24]. So the only instrument for
“pulling” the weak battery with the big differential coefficient to the strong one, is charging with low currents taking
into account all applicable cautions for keeping the original battery chemical structure.
In the proposed algorithm [1] the trickle charge was optional (or secondary). We assumed that the most important
was the initial trickle training charge included the series of charge-discharge impulses for the determination of SOC
and charging current value. However due to the recent research results [5] the trickle charge on the final stage of
charge starts dominating to prevent the early aging of batteries.
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4. Algorithms of Charge with Adding Temperature Control and Trickle Charges

In accordance to these data we found one serious disadvantage in algorithm [1] – the lack of the temperature
control. It is being obvious that each battery type would require specifically determined individual boundary
conditions. In our case we researched LiFePO4 batteries as the most explosively safe and having high
electrochemical potential.
Adding the temperature control feedback into the algorithm taking into account the initial and final trickle charge,
will represent the following chart of charging algorithm for the said batteries [7,9]:

Fig. 1. Algorithm of charge for LiFePO4 battery with trickle charge and temperature feedback.

In Fig. 1:
UOC – open circuit voltage of battery, IB – charging current, Ɍ0 – temperature of battery, ɋ – battery capacity. The
bold elements represent the temperature testing.
In accordance with the proposed chart we then may form the stages of battery charge (discharge) algorithm which
contains the following number of algorithms as it is marked in Fig. 1:
216 E.V. Solomin et al. / Procedia Engineering 129 (2015) 213 – 218

1 – algorithm of initial temperature testing;

2 – algorithm of initial (test and/or training) trickle charge;
3 – algorithm of the main charge by DC current;
4 – algorithm of permanent temperature testing;
5 – algorithm of the main charge by DC voltage;
6 – algorithm of permanent temperature testing;
7 – algorithm of final (finalizing) trickle charge.
The time of the trickle charge N depends on the battery type and developer or manufacturer [25]. Therefore the
duration has to be determined in accordance with the operation manual, recommendations of developer and/or
experimental data. Fig.1 shows that the processes of initial and final trickle charge are relatively long. For shortening
the time of charge the trickle charge could be eliminated. In this case the end-user should make the appropriate
economic calculations taking the following conditions into consideration:
x Eliminating the trickle charge the charger cannot detect the unbalance in battery, therefore the charge would be
finalized by the timer, but the battery wouldn’t be charged in full. In this case it’s necessary to make a calculation
of the probability of this event appearance, then form (determine) a mathematic expectation value of the event on
the base of statistic approaches, evaluate the harm and make a decision about elimination or usage of the said
charging stage.
x In case of eliminating the final trickle charge the battery is the subject of irreversible aging. The characteristic of
degradation is not linear. In this case it’s necessary to evaluate statistically the curve of degradation of batteries
being charged, without trickle charge comparing with the batteries charged up to 100%. The gradient of
differential coefficient will give the information for making a decision on the base of economic analysis about the
usage of the entire trickle charge, taking into account the expenses on energy delivery, idling time on the
charging station and small but unavoidable degradation.
When applying the algorithm to the other, different from [7] batteries, it’s required to use another charge
parameters in accordance with [1,8] and nominal parameters according to the product operation manual(s).
We have to note that the algorithm is a universal tool, and following the above mentioned conditions it cannot
accelerate the battery degradation.
Thus using the proposed algorithm, the positive effect is absolutely predictable but differential coefficient of
degradation must be numerically determined for each type of batteries in the process of the appropriate experimental
research.

5. Temperature Sensor

Special topic of applied research is the determination of location of temperature sensor. As a rule the material of
lithium-ion battery housing is a polymer and it would bring a hysteresis effect and/or data displacement into the
curve of temperature registration recorded by thermal control system on external wall of the battery cell. Moreover
the influence of the next cells may lead to the high differential error in calculation of the cell internal temperature.
Therefore to increase the reliability, the manufacturer of the batteries should be recommended to place temperature
sensors inside each cell. The cost of this arrangement would be significantly less than placing the components of
balancing system into the battery which is widely used now in the production of modern lithium-ion batteries [26].

6. Grid Power Determination

The automatic determination of grid power is required for the evaluation of charging availability for specific
accumulating battery from the given local source. The power source may be in the form of either main or local grid
on the base of low power generators, and therefore the proposed condition should be obligatory for the charger. To
meet these conditions the vehicle should be equipped by the appropriate control apparatus. In some cases, especially
when charging at the stations on the base of renewable energy sources, the grid power determination is required
because in case when the grid charging parameters are insufficient for qualitative charge, the differential coefficient
of degradation will be increased considerably.
 E.V. Solomin et al. / Procedia Engineering 129 (2015) 213 – 218 217

Algorithm of grid power determination is worth the process of determination of available power, in measuring the
voltage drop on terminals of the battery. In general the algorithm of charger control could be proposed in the
following succession:
x Charger should be connected galvanically separately to the grid and battery in accordance with the electric device
connection circuit operation manual. The charger after turning on, measures the voltage both on terminals of the
battery and grid voltage in open circuit duty (the grid and the battery are galvanically disconnected).
x Control system of the charger generates a short impulse(s), 3-5 seconds duration to charge a battery.
x Charger voltage sensor generates a voltage value on the terminals of the battery and the grid, after that the control
system compares the recorded data and those earlier measured on the open circuit duty. If the charger detects the
voltage drop as acceptable value then it shows the appropriate information on display and starts the charge. If the
voltage was sank more than acceptable, in accordance with the optional commands the charger either disconnects
the batteries using the internal contacts, or turns to the duty of charging by small (but available in local grid)
currents, notifying the operator.
x To turn on the small current charge it is necessary to use the following extra algorithm of diagnostics: when the
voltage drops on significantly higher value than available, the charger reduces the voltage on 30% or 70%, acting
by Fibonacci search by coordinate-wise descent with bringing the penalty functions for the most rapid detection
of available voltage.
x After the available voltage is determined, the charger computes the available charge current and turns on the
charge, using the main algorithm but with the applicable corrections.

7. Summary

From the point of view of the general scientific research approaches, the proposed method is a compilation of the
wide spectrum of approaches described in the World literature. Nevertheless the proposed algorithm is the new
instrument in the applied research, proposed as a result of studying the specific batteries [7,9]. Taking into account
that it combines the methods, approaches and algorithms, using in the operation of lithium-ion batteries, with
generating the mass statistics of degradation differential coefficients, the proposed algorithm is important for
improvement of quality and increase of efficiency of charge for newest modern Li-FePO4 batteries and can be
applied for any type of lithium-ion batteries, using the appropriate re-counting of charge-discharge parameters.

Acknowledgements

This study was awarded by RF Ministry of Education and Science under Subsidy Agreement # 14.577.21.0154 of
28.11.2014 (Unique Identifier of Agreement RFMEFI57714X0154). The software patent applications were
accomplished for 3 variants of controller programming.

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