Optimal SOC reference based active cell balancing on a common energy bus of battery

This paper presents a study on the state-of-charge (SOC) reference based active cell balancing in real-time. The optimal references of SOC are determined by using the proposed active cell balancing system with the bidirectional DC/DC converters via the dual active bridge (DAB) type. Then, the energies between cells can be balanced by the power flow control of DAB based bidirectional DC/DC converters. That is, it provides the effective management of battery by transferring energy from the strong cell to the weak one until the cell voltages are equalized to the same level and therefore improving the additional charging capacity of battery. In particular, the cell aging of battery and power loss caused from energy transfer are considered. The performances of proposed active cell balancing system are evaluated by an electromagnetic transient program (EMTP) simulation. Then, the experimental prototype is implemented in hardware to verify the usefulness of proposed system.