Abstract
The electrolyte is one of the components that releases the most heat during the thermal runaway (TR) and combustion process of lithium-ion batteries (LIBs). Therefore, the thermal hazard of the electrolyte has a significant impact on the safety of LIBs. In this paper, the combustion characteristics of the electrolyte such as parameters of heat release rate (HRR), mass loss rate (MLR) and total heat release (THR) have been investigated and analyzed. In order to meet the current demand of plateau sections with low-pressure and low-oxygen areas on LIBs, an electrolyte with the most commonly used lithium salts, LiPF6, was chosen as the experimental sample. Due to the superior low-temperature performance, an electrolyte containing LiBF4 was also selected to be compared with the LiPF6 sample. Combustion experiments were conducted for electrolyte pool fire under various altitudes. According to the experimental results, both the average and peak values of MLR in the stable combustion stage of the electrolyte pool fire had positive exponential relations with the atmospheric pressure. At the relatively higher altitude, there was less THR, and the average and peak values of HRR decreased significantly, while the combustion duration increased remarkably when compared with that at the lower altitude. The average HRR of the electrolyte with LiBF4 was obviously lower than that of solution containing LiPF6 under low atmospheric pressure, which was slightly higher for LiBF4 electrolyte at standard atmospheric pressure. Because of the low molecular weight (MW) of LiBF4, the THR of the corresponding electrolyte was larger, so the addition of LiBF4 could not effectively improve the safety of the electrolyte. Moreover, the decrease of pressure tended to increase the production of harmful hydrogen fluoride (HF) gas.