Study of Indirect Heat Pump for an Electric Vehicle 2023-28-0023
Electric Vehicle is the need of an hour, as due to excessive usage of IC Engine vehicles has resulted in the depletion of the ozone layer to a significant level and fuel cost is increasing. With new technologies coming into the market, challenges come hand in hand because of Electric Vehicle.
In comparison to IC Vehicle, areas of thermal management or the number of components for which thermal management needs to be done is higher and rather complex. As the thermal management system is the second highest energy consuming source after the powertrain of the electric vehicle, an efficient and reliable design is mandatory to ensure better range in an Electric Vehicle.
Thermal Management of the Electric Vehicle has been identified as one of the critical parameters for balancing both cabin comfort as well as Battery temperature.
One of the major concerns is meeting the Cabin comfort during colder weather with minimum energy consumption. Using the PTC heater to heat the cabin consumes more energy as compared to Normal Heat pump system for an Electric vehicle. In our study, in-direct Heat pump System helps by taking the heat from the compressor of the refrigerant circuit and transferring it to the coolant circuit. The coolant circuit then heats both the battery and cabin, providing a more efficient and cost-effective method. The use of a water-cooled condenser in this system ensures that the battery & cabin is heated with the coolant, which is energy efficient than using a PTC heater.
The Indirect Heat Pump has several advantages over the PTC heater because it consumes less energy, which means that it is more environmentally friendly and improves the range. Hence study of Indirect Heat Pump shows that the energy consumed by the compressor during the Cabin heating is almost 40% lesser compared to use of Auxiliary PTC heater and improved the Range by 3 ~ 4%.
