Performance Analysis of Energy Storage Unit with

Lead-acid and Lithium Iron Phosphate Battery

Rahul Kumar
Department of Electrical Engineering Dr. Shivam Vaibhav Patil
National Institute of Technology Department of Electrical Engineering IGT MoS R&D
Kurukshetra National Institute of Technology Philips India Limited
rahulrev97@gmail.com Kurukshetra Pune
2022 4th International Conference on Energy, Power and Environment (ICEPE) | 978-1-6654-7124-4/22/$31.00 ©2022 IEEE | DOI: 10.1109/ICEPE55035.2022.9798153

shivam@nitkkr.ac.in vaibhav.patil@philips.com

Abstract— An energy storage unit is used to storage energy into exponential zone and nominal zone. The exponential zone
in batteries that is used to supply power whenever the need width depends on the type of the battery. The nominal zone
arises. In today’s market most energy storage units that are still represents the capacity of the battery before the nominal
being used are based on lead-acid battery chemistry. Lithium voltage is reached and the last zone represents the end of
based batteries have become easily available and is an charge zone where voltage drops rapidly.
acceptable replacement for lead-acid battery. Lithium Iron
Phosphate (LiFePO4) has been found to be a suitable For the exponential area of the curve, there is a hysteresis
replacement for the lead-acid batteries. It is used as replacement phenomenon between charging and discharging in this region.
as it provides higher power capacity for the same cost and its This exponential curve is represented by the equation:
capability to avoid thermal runaway. The modelling and
simulation of both batteries is done in MATLAB to analyze the ∙| |∙ ∙ (1)
expected changes in the system parameters for upgrading to where,
lithium battery.
Exponential zone voltage (V)
Keywords—Lead-acid, LiFePO4, Energy Storage Unit
Battery current (A)
I. INTRODUCTION
Charge or discharge mode
Energy storage systems are used in large number of
applications from healthcare devices, solar/wind energy The exponential curve depends on the initial value of
storage, common household inverters to large scale and the value of 1 for charging state of
uninterrupted power supply systems. Electrochemical energy battery and 0 for discharging state.
storage devices offer the flexibility in capacity, siting, and
rapid response required to meet application demands over a
much wider range of functions than many other types of
storage [1]. Most of the energy storage systems are based on a
lead-based battery as these lead based batteries are most
common and easily available.
Lead batteries are highly toxic and needs maintenance
over time, also proper disposal of lead-acid batteries is
considerably tough and a pose a risk to personnel safety [2].
Whereas lithium batteries solve most of the issues of Fig. 1: Discharge characteristics of Batteries
maintenance and disposal. Lithium Iron Phosphate (LiFePO4),
a chemistry is used as replacement as it provides higher power
capacity for the same cost and its capability to avoid thermal
runaway [3]. Lithium iron phosphate battery is highly safe and
thermally stable, even when operated at higher ambient
temperature [4]. The lithium batteries have highest weight to
energy ratio and also provide best energy to space ratio [5].
In this paper, Lithium iron phosphate battery is proposed
for an energy storage unit which is being used in a medical Fig. 2: Battery Discharge Model
device. It is also modelled with the existing system equipment Fig. 2 shows the complete discharge voltage model. The
of the energy storage system. The LiFePO4 batteries also discharge model considers the open circuit voltage as a
provide faster charge time, which makes them suitable for function of state of charge of battery [5].
frequent charge and discharge applications [2].
The voltage of the cell for charging the Lead-acid battery
The modelling of battery is done in MATLAB and the is given by equation:
results have been verified with the data provided by the
datasheet for both batteries. Test cases have been generated ∗
∙ ∙ ∙
are based on the application of the energy storage unit. 0.1 ∙

II. MODELLING OF LEAD-ACID BATTERY CELL (2)

The open circuit voltage of batteries is a function of And for discharging is given by equation:
remaining charge of the battery. The discharge characteristics ∗
of a battery is shown in the Fig. 2 [5]. The curve can be divided ∙ ∙ ∙ (3)
! !

978-1-6654-7124-4/22/$31.00 ©2022 IEEE

Authorized licensed use limited to: NED UNIV OF ENGINEERING AND TECHNOLOGY. Downloaded on February 21,2023 at 10:34:44 UTC from IEEE Xplore. Restrictions apply.
 where, There are many lithium-based chemistries available in
market, but for our application LiFePO4 was chosen because
Open circuit battery voltage (V) of its capability of providing large discharge currents
Battery constant voltage (V) comparable to lead-acid and high safety factor, i.e., to avoid
thermal runaway. The same procedure as that of the lead-acid
Polarization constant (V/Ah) or polarization is adopted to model the lithium battery in MATLAB using the
resistance (Ω) equations (4) and (5).
Battery capacity (Ah)
3.5

Battery Output Voltage

∫ # Actual battery charge (Ah)
3.3
exponential zone amplitude (V)
3.1
exponential zone time constant inverse (Ah)-1
2.9
internal resistance (Ω)
2.7
battery current (A)
∗ 2.5
filtered current (A) [7]
0 0.4 0.8 1.2 1.6 2 2.4
One of the objectives of this paper is to determine the what Discharge (Ah)
factors should be considered when upgrading your existing Manufacture Data Model Output
lead-acid energy storage system to lithium-based storage
system. As such the first step is to identify your existing Fig. 4: LiFePO4 battery model
batteries and determine the discharge characteristics of these
batteries [7]. This can be done either by performing the The comparison of output voltage of simulated model and
discharge of a full charged battery at constant 0.2C rate and manufacturer data of lithium cell is shown in Fig. 4. The
recording the voltage output for the same or get the discharge maximum deviation we see is at 2.4Ah discharge for model
characteristics from manufacture datasheet [10]. and datasheet data we have 2.95V and 2.876V respectively.
The model is then simulated in MATLAB using the equations It is observed that the maximum error in simulated and
(1) and (3) and discharge characteristics for 0.2C current was manufacture is 2.5%, which is well within acceptable limits
obtained. The output voltage of battery is then compared to and hence both these models have been used for the rest of the
the discharge curve for 0.2C current previously obtained. analysis.
IV. ENERGY STORAGE SYSTEM PARAMETERS
2.3
Battery Output Voltage

The energy storage system contains a battery pack made

2.2
of 156 battery lead-acid cells which are all connected in series
2.1 making the total pack nominal voltage of 312V. The
2 application of Energy Storage System is always in float mode
1.9 which means that the batteries are not charged to the full State
1.8 of Charge (SOC). The energy storage system is charged from
AC mains supply of 230V and the load that the energy storage
1.7
system supplies is a pulsed load of high power of 12kW. There
1.6 are various differences in the parameters of the lead-acid and
0 2 4 6 lithium-based chemistries. Table 1 shows the parameters for
Time (hours)
Manufacture Data Model Output
both the cells.
Table 1: Battery Parameters [11]
Fig. 3: Modelling of lead-acid battery cell

The comparison of model and the manufacturer data for a Parameter Lead-acid cell LiFePO4 cell
lead-acid battery cell is shown in Fig. 3. It can be seen that
Nominal Voltage 2V 3.3 V
model has a very low error of maximum 1.5% near the end of
charge of battery. Max Discharge 90 A 50 A (continuous)
Current 120 A (pulse)
III. MODELLING OF LIFEPO4 BATTERY CELL Internal Resistance 0.005 Ω 0.006 Ω

The voltage of the cell for charging the Li-ion battery is given Nominal capacity 2.5 Ah 2.5 Ah
by equation:
Charging voltage 2.45 V 3.6 V
∗
∙ ∙ $ ∙ ∙
! ! %.&∙
(4) Hence for upgrading to lithium, there are few factors that
And for discharging is given by equation: should be considered as this might result in more than a few
changes in the existing energy storage system. When
∙ ∙ $ ∙ ∙ ∗ designing the lithium pack for the existing system, the
! !
(5) following have been done:

Authorized licensed use limited to: NED UNIV OF ENGINEERING AND TECHNOLOGY. Downloaded on February 21,2023 at 10:34:44 UTC from IEEE Xplore. Restrictions apply.
 A. Identifying parameters of cells:
The battery parameters as declared by manufacture is
depicted in Table 1. These are parameters that have been used
in modelling of cell for the purpose of simulation [4].
B. Battery Stack:
The nominal voltage of lead-acid cell is 2v whereas the
nominal voltage of a LiFePO4 cell is 3.3v. The charging
voltage of the lead acid cell is 2.3v for this application as it
being used in float operation mode and 3.6v for LiFePO4 cell.
The number of cells for the new battery pack depends on the
parameter one need to maintain same.
1) For maintaing the same operating range of the cell,
the number of cells should be:
' ()$* +, - ℎ ( /$001 2 1$* $1
' ()$* +, -$3# 4$001 ∗ '+( 230 5+0 36$ +, /$00
'+( 230 5+0 36$ +, - ℎ ( /$00
(6)
In this case, for charging the lithium pack using the energy
storage system charger may result in improper charging as the
charging voltage will not be the same as charging voltage
required by the lithium cells. Also, the charging algorithm for
lead-acid battery is nearly same as that of LiFePO4 battery.
2) For using the same charging system:
' ()$* +, - ℎ ( /$001 2 1$* $1
4ℎ3*6 26 5+0 36$ +, /ℎ3*6$*
4ℎ3*6 26 5+0 36$ +, - ℎ ( /$00
(7)
In this case, the same charger can be used without any
modifications but during the operation the output voltage of
the battery may not be the same as the lead-acid battery and
may cause unexpected issues in the battery-operated
equipment and devices. For the purpose of not modifying any
other equipment in energy storage system, the equation 7 is
used and the resulting LiFePO4 battery pack is considered for
104 cells (considering 3.5v per cell charge voltage) in the
simulation.
V. EXPERIMENTAL SETUP
The basic block diagram of the experimental setup is
shown in figure 5. The experimental setup is comprised of the
battery pack, and for the load, a HF generator is used. The
components in the system have following parameters:
Table 2: System Parameters
Fig. 5: Block diagram of simulation
The energy storage system is charged from the mains supply
using pulse charging technique. The battery is disconnected
from mains after charging. The HF generator is used as a
system load because of its capability to draw large amount of
current in a short duration of time. The analysis is done for
two test cases of same average power and different frequency
of HF generator. The HF generator is coupled with a capacitor
bank at its input. The capacitor bank charges from the battery
pack and stores charge till needed by the HF generator. When
the generator turns on and current requirements are high for
provided voltage, the capacitor bank provides the additional
current required. The total input current to the HF generator is
the sum of capacitor current and battery output current.
Table 3: Test cases for Simulation
Test Case Output Max Power Output Pulse Width
Voltage Output (ms)
1 120 KV 12 KW 4.4 ms
2 120 KV 12 KW Continuous run of
4.4ms
Table 3 shows the test cases that were performed on the
experimental setup and then simulated for lead-acid battery
using the model designed in section II. The test cases
mentioned above have been simulated for the 100%, 80%,
50% and 30% state of charges for both cases and results are
shown.
VI. SIMULATION RESULTS: CASE 1
For the test case 1, where the power input of
generator is 15kW and generates a 4.4 ms of pulse, the
observed system parameters are shown below:

Parameter Battery Pack HF Generator

Input Voltage 234-365v DC 234-365v DC

Rating
Fig. 6: Battery Output Current for lead-acid 100% SOC
Power Rating 400W 25KW

Input Current 1A (max) 1.5A (continuous) and

Rating 11A (max) for sub-
system
Output Voltage 234-365v DC 120kV DC

Output Current 90A (max) 125mA

Rating

Fig. 7: Battery Output Current for LiFePO4 100% SOC

Authorized licensed use limited to: NED UNIV OF ENGINEERING AND TECHNOLOGY. Downloaded on February 21,2023 at 10:34:44 UTC from IEEE Xplore. Restrictions apply.
 Fig. 8: Capacitor bank current for lead-acid 100% SOC Fig. 14: Battery Output Current for LiFePO4 80% SOC

Fig. 9: Capacitor bank current for LiFePO4 100% SOC Fig. 15: Battery Output Current for LiFePO4 80% SOC

Fig. 10: HF Generator input current for lead-acid 100% SOC Fig. 16: Capacitor bank current for LiFePO4 80% SOC

Fig. 11: HF Generator input current for LiFePO4 100% SOC Fig. 17: Capacitor bank current for LiFePO4 80% SOC

Fig. 12: Battery Voltage for lead-acid 4.4 ms pulse discharge Fig. 18: HF Generator input current for LiFePO4 80% SOC

Fig. 13: Battery Voltage for LiFePO4 4.4 ms pulse discharge Fig. 19: HF Generator input current for LiFePO4 80% SOC

Authorized licensed use limited to: NED UNIV OF ENGINEERING AND TECHNOLOGY. Downloaded on February 21,2023 at 10:34:44 UTC from IEEE Xplore. Restrictions apply.
 42

Max HF Generator
40

Current (A)
38
36
34
32
Fig. 20: Battery Voltage for LiFePO4 4.4 ms pulse discharge
30
Lead-acid LiFePO4
100%soc 80%soc 50%soc 30%soc

Fig. 24: Maximum HF Generator input current at various SOC

VII. SIMULATION RESULTS: CASE 2

For the test case 2, where the power input of HF
Generator is 15kW and generates a 4.4 ms of pulse for 30
Fig. 21: Battery Voltage for LiFePO4 4.4 ms pulse discharge pulses per second, the observed system parameters are shown
In the above figures, the blue plot depicts the measured below:
parameter of lead-acid battery whereas the red plot depicts the
measured parameter of LiFePO4 battery. The Fig. 6 to Fig. 13
depicts the system parameters that are observed at full charge
condition of battery i.e., 100% SOC. The Fig. 14 to Fig. 21
depicts the system parameters that are observed at 80% SOC.
This is the test case 1, where the power input of generator is
15kW and generates a 4.4 ms of pulse but the battery is not
completely charged.
Fig. 6, Fig. 7, Fig. 14 and Fig. 15 shows the current
that is supplied by the batteries. Fig. 8, Fig. 9, Fig 16 and Fig.
17 shows the capacitor bank current that is delivered to the Fig. 25: Battery Output Current for lead-acid 100% SOC
generator. Fig. 10, Fig. 11, Fig. 18 and Fig. 19 shows the total
input current of the HF Generator at 100%soc and 80%soc,
respectively. And the battery voltage for these operations is
shown in Fig. 12, Fig. 13, Fig. 20 and Fig. 21. The simulation
was done for the various state of charge of lead-acid as well
as LiFePO4 battery. Fig. 22 shows the variation of battery
output voltage for various state of charge for lead-acid
battery.
360 Fig. 26: Battery Output Current for LiFePO4 100% SOC
Lead-acid Output
Voltage (V)

340

320

300
0.3 0.4 0.5 0.6 0.7
voltage 100%soc voltage 80%soc
voltage 50%soc voltage 30%soc

Fig. 22: Lead-acid Battery Voltage at various SOC Fig. 27: Capacitor bank current for lead-acid 100% SOC
LiFePO4 Output
Voltage (V)

330
0.3 0.4 0.5 0.6 0.7
voltage 100%soc voltage 80%soc

Fig. 23: LiFePO4 Battery Voltage at various SOC Fig. 28: Capacitor bank current for LiFePO4 100% SOC

Authorized licensed use limited to: NED UNIV OF ENGINEERING AND TECHNOLOGY. Downloaded on February 21,2023 at 10:34:44 UTC from IEEE Xplore. Restrictions apply.

Figure 29: HF Generator input current for lead-acid 100% SOC
Figure 30: HF Generator input current for LiFePO4 100% SOC
Figure 20: Battery Voltage for 4.4 ms pulse discharge
Figure 17 shows the current that is supplied by the
batteries. Figure 18 shows the capacitor bank current that is
delivered to the generator. Figure 19 shows the total input
current of the HF Generator at 100% for lead-acid battery and
LiFePO4. The battery voltage for the continuous run operation
is shown in Figure 20. For upgrading the lead-acid battery to
the LiFePO4 battery without modifying the existing energy
storage equipment, the simulations have been done for both
models and results are shown in Section VI. It is observed that
as the state of charge decreases, the lead-acid shows large
voltage drop and as such for constant power load, the current
increases and hence increases the losses in the system which
are shown in Table 4. Table 4 shows the percentage increase
in power loss of the energy storage system when compare to
the 100% state of charge. It is observed that power loss as heat
in the cables is reduced and hence improving the heat
management of the system.
Table 4: Results for Simulation
Battery 80%SOC 50%SOC 30%SOC
Type
Lead-acid 24.95% 27.92% 32.49%
LiFePO4 8.21% 9.45% 11.44%
Authorized licensed use limited to: NED UNIV OF ENGINEERING AND TECHNOLOGY. Downloaded on February 21,2023 at 10:34:44 UTC from IEEE Xplore. Restrictions apply.
VIII. CONCLUSION
Performance analysis of the experimental setup of the
energy storage unit is carried out in MATLAB Simulink and
various test cases are performed for number of states of charge
of battery. In case 1, it helped in determining the voltage drop
across the states of charges and increase in the current
withdrawn from energy storage system. Also, it has been
found that upgrading to LiFePO4 has improved the heat
management and also the voltage profile of the system. The
lithium battery provides faster voltage recovery after load is
removed. In test case 2, it is observed that in case of lead-acid
the voltage drop is steep over the time period whereas the in
LiFePO4 it is relatively less steep. The performance of the
system has improved in terms of wiring losses, heat generation
and voltage profile. These curves provide important
information about system performance and stability.
REFERENCES
[1] M. T. Lawder et al., "Battery Energy Storage System (BESS) and
Battery Management System (BMS) for Grid-Scale Applications," in
Proceedings of the IEEE, vol. 102, no. 6, pp. 1014-1030, June 2014,
doi: 10.1109/JPROC.2014.2317451.
[2] A. A. Mahmud, I. B. Jafar, A. Zaman and M. Rahman, "Performance
study of lead-acid battery in a solar car under different traffic and
weather conditions," 2016 4th International Conference on the
Development in the in Renewable Energy Technology (ICDRET),
2016, pp. 1-4, doi: 10.1109/ICDRET.2016.7421475.
[3] Bukhari, S. M. A. S., Maqsood, J., Baig, M. Q., Ashraf, S., & Khan, T.
A. (2015, March). Comparison of Characteristics--Lead Acid, Nickel
Based, Lead Crystal and Lithium Based Batteries. In 2015 17th
UKSim-AMSS International Conference on Modelling and Simulation
(UKSim) (pp. 444-450). IEEE.
[4] V. Karthigeyan, M. Aswin, L. Priyanka, K. N. D. Sailesh and K.
Palanisamy, "A comparative study of lithium ion (LFP) to lead acid
(VRLA) battery for use in telecom power system," 2017 International
Conference on Computation of Power, Energy Information and
Commuincation (ICCPEIC), 2017, pp. 742-748, doi:
10.1109/ICCPEIC.2017.8290462.
[5] Huang, Y. (2017, October). An Innovative lithium-ion battery and lead-
acid battery hybrid solution for telecom in frequent grid off region. In
2017 IEEE International Telecommunications Energy Conference
(INTELEC) (pp. 311-313). IEEE.
[6] Keshan, H., Thornburg, J., & Ustun, T. S. (2016). Comparison of lead-
acid and lithium ion batteries for stationary storage in off-grid energy
systems.
[7] Azzollini, Ilario Antonio, Valerio Di Felice, Francesco Fraboni,
Lorenzo Cavallucci, Marco Breschi, Alberto Dalla Rosa, and Gabriele
Zini. "Lead-acid battery modeling over full state of charge and
discharge range." IEEE Transactions on Power Systems 33, no. 6
(2018): 6422-6429.
[8] Stan, A. I., Swierczynski, M., Stroe, D. I., Teodorescu, R., Andreasen,
S. J., & Moth, K. (2014, September). A comparative study of lithium
ion to lead acid batteries for use in UPS applications. In 2014 IEEE
36th international telecommunications energy conference (INTELEC)
(pp. 1-8). IEEE.Omar N., M. A. Monem, Y. Firouz, J. Salminen, J.
Smekens, O. Hegazy, H. Gaulous, G. Mulder, P. Van den Bossche, T.
Coosemans, and J. Van Mierlo. “Lithium iron phosphate based battery
— Assessment of the aging parameters and development of cycle life
model.” Applied Energy, Vol. 113, January 2014, pp. 1575–1585.
[9] Tremblay, O., L.A. Dessaint, "Experimental Validation of a Battery
Dynamic Model for EV Applications." World Electric Vehicle Journal.
Vol. 3, May 13–16, 2009
[10] Roiu, D., Primon, A., Rossella, M., & Ornato, M. (2017, June). 12V
battery modeling: Model development, simulation and validation. In
2017 International Conference of Electrical and Electronic
Technologies for Automotive (pp. 1-5). IEEE.
[11] Lithium Battery Manufacturer | Lithium Batteries | Lithium Werks
Manufacture datasheet