An Integrated State of Health (SOH) Balancing Method for Lithium-Ion Battery Cells

This paper proposes a novel methodology to balance the State of Health (SOH) of lithium-ion battery cells which are connected in series through DC/DC converters. SOH has been emerged as the critical battery health indicator besides the State of Charge (SOC), battery internal resistance and other conventional precursors. SOH balancing is crucial for utilizing the battery cells which shows different capacity characteristics due to aging factor. A simplified SOH balancing topology of liion battery cells which are connected through DC/DC converters providing power to a common load is proposed. The simplified SOH balancing method is well applicable to cases where battery maintenance accessibility is limited. Additionally, employing the proposed SOH balancing scheme would enhance the operational life time of total battery storage unit and reduce the battery replacement cost. Extensive simulations have been presented in this paper to validate the proof of concept.