Cross-Level Impact Analysis (CLIA) Approach for Automotive Battery System: OEM Requirements and Case Study

Traction battery systems for electrified vehicles currently on the market employ primarily lithium-ion batteries (LIBs). In light of increasing system complexity and rapid technological evolution, the automotive industry faces challenges in adequately integrating next-generation battery technologies to meet the stakeholders’ requirements. To support future battery system development, early-stage understanding of the upcoming battery technologies and their impact on higher-level subsystems (module, pack, system) is critical. Existing battery development methods remain domain-specific and fragmented across system hierarchies, lacking holistic consideration from cell chemistry, higher-level (sub)systems up to the vehicle level. Meanwhile, current Systems Engineering (SE) approaches lack specialized application for cross-disciplinary impact analysis in battery systems [1]. We propose the Cross-Level Impact Analysis (CLIA) framework, a Model-Based Systems Engineering (MBSE) framework using SysML for systematically modelling dependencies within the battery system and tracing property changes across (sub)systems. To address real-world challenges, integrating frontline OEM perspectives is crucial. ... mehrSpecifically, in-depth discussions with Chinese OEMs are conducted to identify the key requirements for cross-level impact analysis for automotive battery systems. To assess how well the current CLIA approach can fulfill the identified requirements, a comprehensive case study demonstrates CLIA application to quantify the extent of impacts: Changes in anode thickness were traced to cell-level performance (lifetime and capacity), with results aligning with published experimental data. This paper shows the potential of the CLIA approach to prospectively investigate impacts of future battery technology generations and provide strategic decision-making foundations for battery technology roadmaps. Future work will verify CLIA through industrial use cases, focusing on practical deployment of the CLIA to derive boundary conditions for Next-Gen battery system design considering a future battery technology (e.g. all-solid-state battery) with an industry partner to demonstrate and evaluate its applicability and usability.