Passive & Active Cell Balance Techniques for Applications with Lithium Ion Battery

Introduction
As portable devices come into wide use, e.g. portable power tools, handheld PCs and smartphones, various
types of batteries, such as Lead-acid, NiMH and LiB(Lithium-Ion Battery) are researched and applied due to the
compact size and light weight.
Among them, LiBs have relatively higher rated voltage of 3.4 ~ 4.2 V and outstanding energy density rather
than other batteries so that high voltage and capacity could be easily achieved with a low number of LiBs
connected in series. However, LiBs have some drawbacks; a) explosion at the worst caused by an over-charging,
over-temperature and outside impact; b) characteristics degradation by an over-discharging as well as the
causes mentioned in a); and c) a battery operation time reduction by capacity unbalance of batteries or cell
unbalance issue. To avoid the first two drawbacks protection circuits are necessarily used together with LiBs. In
addition, CB (Cell Balance) Circuit is required to solve the cell unbalance issue out.
In this article, it will be explained briefly what makes the cell unbalance issue, and what types of solutions have
been developed to get rid of it. Each solutions pros and cons will be also described for engineers working in
BMS(Battery management system).

Cell Unbalance Issue & Approaches to solve

The cell unbalance means that the capacity of each battery becomes different. It is usually caused by physical
and electrical characteristics tolerance of batteries. In detail, cell unbalance in multiple-series batteries is
generally known to be caused by tiny mismatch of capacity deterioration ratio and an internal resistance or
self-discharge resistance equivalently connected to a battery in parallel at mass production, as well as external
circuit configurations. Even though the capacity deterioration ratio and internal resistance are well controlled
as technologies regarding battery manufacture are improved, the tiny mismatch effect gradually increases and
affects performance of battery as time goes on as shown in Figure 1.
Figure 2 shows an example of battery pack and its battery at full-charging and full-discharging states where
three batteries are connected in series. Protection switches are placed the lines between the batteries and
outside a charger and load, which are controlled by a protection IC. Assume that a capacity of one of batteries
is uneven in the structure and a charger is connected with the battery pack as shown in Figure 2(a). The battery
with the lowest capacity cannot be fully charged since charging procedure is finished until the total battery
voltage is equal to the output voltage of the charger or the protection IC may turn off the protection switches
in case of one or more batteries enter into over-charging state. And then, at a discharging state, running time of
the battery pack is limited by a battery with the lowest capacity. Namely, the battery cannot be fully used at the
cell unbalance state as shown in Figure 2. (b). A circuit is necessary to prevent the cell unbalance case, which is
called CB circuit.
Basic concept of CB circuits is to generally equalize energy of each battery. Many types of cell balance circuits
are researched to prevent the imbalance among batteries with low cost and less time to balance. In the
category shown in Figure 3, cell balance is divided into two types of a passive and active cell balance according
to a point of view of power dissipation. A passive cell balance method is to equal voltage of all batteries with
consuming the energy of battery. On the contrary, active cell balance methods are to redistribute energy
between batteries with low power-loss adopting capacitor or inductor components.

Passive Cell Balance

Fundamental structures of the passive CB are that one is to use a resistor connected with a battery in parallel
which is called Fixed Resistive CB method, or another is to use a resistor and switch are connected with a
battery which is called Resistive Switching CB method as shown in Figure 4. A basic operation is to consume
energy using the resistor from a battery with the highest voltage until the battery voltage equals to another
battery with the lowest voltage where a current consumed by the resistor is called a bleeding current. The fixed
resistive cell balance is the simplest than any CB methods developed so far, but power loss is always dissipated
so that it is rarely used in present. In the resistive switching CB, power dissipation could be reduced by a switch
placed between a resistor and battery.
As you can guess at the structure and operation, this ways give some benefits - low cost, easy implementation
and good reliability. However, owing to the power dissipation by the resistor, thermal management should be
considered. Therefore a bleeding current is generally limited smaller than 50 mA. Notice that total CB time
could be increased as long as a bleeding current is low. Because of those features, these methods are mainly
used for low power LiB applications, such as portable tools, e-bike and so on.

Active Cell Balance

Capacitive-Shuttle Cell Balance
Figure 5 shows a capacitive-shuttle CB circuit(hereinafter capacitive CB) with single and multiple capacitors. A
capacitive CB method basically consists of one or more capacitors and a plurality of switches for exchange
energy among batteries. A concept of basic operation is that energy of a battery with the highest or higher
voltage is transferred into the shuttle capacitor and then, the energy of the shuttle capacitor is transferred
again into a battery with the lowest or lower voltage, resulting in redistribution of supplement energy.
Based on the operational concept with a condition of that voltage of BAT1 is higher than others in Figure 6 (a),
Q1 turns on during T1 and energy of BAT1 is stored into CSHUTTLE during TCHG where current waveform can be
formed as iBAL as illustrated in Figure 6 (b). During T2, Q1 turns off and Q2 turns on. Accordingly, the energy of
BAT1 is transferred to BAT2 with current waveform of iBAL during TDSG.
In the methods, average balance current is dependent on voltage difference and ESR(Equivalent Series
Resistance) between the battery and shuttle capacitor, and a time constant, TCHG by the shuttle capacitance and
ESR. The lower voltage difference becomes or the longer total time period of T1 and T2 becomes, the smaller
average balance current is. Typically total cell balance time could be larger than other active cell balance
methods.
With assuming T1 is enough larger than the time constant, average balance current in a period can be
calculated as follow;

T 2

C Shuttle VBH VBL 1 e
1 ESRC Shuttle [A ] .
iBAL
T

Assume that Q1 and Q2 complementarily turn on during T1 and T2, respectively, whose total time is around 10
times a time constant of ESR-CSHUTTLE. ESR exists in practice, and then the average balance current in a period
can be simplified as follow;

iBAL
VBH VBL [A] .
10 ESR
Advantages of this method are a) high efficiency owing to losses by only ESR as well as b) relatively inexpensive
among some active CB methods. On the contrary, drawbacks are; a) complicated switches structure; b) inrush
current flowing into the shuttle capacitors; and c) relatively small balancing current than other active CB
methods. Comparing with both capacitive CB methods, the one with single capacitor requires switches of 2n
lower than 4(n-1) switches required in one with multiple capacitors where n is the number of battery. On the
other hands, the capacitive CB with single capacitor cannot perform simultaneously due to the single capacitor
unlike one with multiple capacitors, which causes CB operation time longer. For those features, the capacitive
CB method with single capacitor is suitable for some applications with a small number and low capacity of
batteries, e.g. portable tools, wireless vacuum cleaners and so on.

Inductive shuttle method

Figure 7 shows an inductive shuttle CB(hereinafter inductive CB) with single and multiple inductors. The basic
operation of Inductive methods including the both examples is similar to the capacitive methods. Difference
point is that some capacitors in the capacitive CB methods are replaced to inductors. Basically inductor draws
energy of a battery with the highest or higher voltage and delivers to a battery with the lowest or lower voltage.
In Figure 8(a), Q1 turns on and then the energy of BAT1 is stored into the inductor, LSHUTTLE during T1. During T2,
Q1 is turned off and Q2 turns on and then the energy charged into LSHUTTLE is delivered to BAT2. The current
transferred between batteries is illustrated in Figure 8(b).
According to the waveforms, average balance current can be calculated as follow if iBAL is enough to be zero
within T2;

iBAL
T 2 2
VBL
[A] .
2 (T 1 T 2) LSHUTTLE
Efficiency of the methods is also high, similar to the capacitive CB methods, compared to the passive one. On
the contrary, there is no inrush current and average balance current could be designed to be constant during all
CB operation and relatively high against the capacitive CB methods so that total balance time is smaller than
the capacitive CB methods. Drawbacks are that switches structure is complicated and cost is relatively
expensive than the capacitive CB methods. These methods are fit for some applications which require short CB
operation time. For shorter CB operation time, the inductive CB method with multiple is suitable, because one
with single inductor cannot perform simultaneously too, like the capacitive CB method with single capacitor.

Individual charging cell balance method

In view of energy conversion and transfer, switching dc-dc converters e.g. buck, buck-boost, flyback, forward
converter and so on, are generally used as a very efficient solution. Active CB methods based on the switching
converter concept are called Individual Charging CB method. Figure 9 shows examples of an individual
charging CB with single winding and multi winding. In Figure 9, the flyback converter is implemented for
individual charging CB method. The input terminal of the converter is connected to the electrodes of the
uppermost and undermost battery and the output one is connected to the batteries each electrodes through
switches. The basic operation is that the converter delivers energy to one or more batteries with low voltage
from all batteries.
These methods are the most expensive, but efficiency is better than other active CB methods and even balance
time can be reduce extremely short because cell balance current can be larger. These CB methods are usually
applied with relative expensive and high power applications, such as UPS (Uninterrupted Power Supply), ESS
(Energy Storage System), E-Vehicles and etc.

Conclusion
In this article, it was introduced briefly root-causes of cell unbalance, necessity of a CB circuit in the
applications using LiB and features of some passive and active cell balances have been developed so far. In
addition, it is sure that cell unbalance is one of important issues for LiBs, which is closely related with operating
time and stability of LiBs. Adopting cell balance circuits to prevent cell unbalance means spending some money,
on the other hands, it expects that they could sufficiently help performance improvement of LiB and BMS. If
you need further technical information regarding BMS ICs or its application technique, feel free to contact
Fairchild Semiconductor website (www.fairchildsemi.com).
Figures

a) RLK1 > RLK2

Voltage
Charging
Duration
VBAT1
Full Charging
Voltage
VBAT2
CBAT1 RLK1

3month 3month time

b) Deterioration ratio CBAT1 > CBAT2

Capacity

CBAT2 RLK2
Initial
Capacity

Cycle
(Charging-Discharging)
Battery
Pack1

c) Operating current Circuit1 > Circuit 2

BMS Voltage
Circuit1 Charging
Duration
VPACK2
Full Charging
Voltage
VPACK1

BMS
Circuit2 Operation Operation time

Battery
Pack2

Figure 1. Main cause of cell-unbalance phenomenon.

(a)
 Battery Pack

Load

15% 0% 15% BMS

(b)
Figure 2. Typical circuit diagram of battery pack and battery capacity state at (a) completely charging and (top)
(b) and fully discharging (bottom).

Figure 3. The category of cell balance methods

Figure 4. Typical passive cell balance circuit, a fixed resistive(left) and resistive switching method(right)
 Figure 5. Capacitive CB with single capacitor (left) and multiple capacitors (right)

Figure 6. Operational circuit (top) and waveforms (bottom) of the capacitive CB with single capacitor
 Figure 7. Inductive CB circuit with an inductor (left) or multiple inductors (right)

a) Operational Circuit

i) Interval T1 ii) Interval T2

c
Balancing Controller Balancing Controller

Battery Cells iBAL Battery Cells

BAT1 Q1 BAT1 Q1
(VBH) (VBH)
LSHUTTLE
LSHUTTLE iBAL
Q3 BAT2 Q2 Q3 BAT2 Q2
(VBL) (VBL)

Q4 BAT3 Q4 BAT3

b) Operational Waveforms

T1: only Q1 on T2: only Q2 on

iBAL

VBH
IBAL,PK
iL,SHUTTLE iL,SHUTTLE
VBL
LSHUTTLE LSHUTTLE

Figure 8. Operational circuit (top) and waveforms (bottom) of the inductive CB circuit with an inductor or
multiple inductors
Figure 9. Individual charging CB method based on flyback converter using single winding(left) or multi
winding(right)