Isothermal calorimetry, a non-abusive and non-destructive technique, provides fundamental information to quantify accurately [1]:
- Endothermic and exothermic events, expressed in power (W) and energy (kJ)
- Heat release/uptake profiles during charge/discharge
- Thermal hotspots across cells and modules
- Changes in thermal behavior over repeated cycles (aging and degradation)
Unlike Accelerated Rate Calorimetry, which drives a cell into thermal runaway under adiabatic conditions to study abuse behaviour, isothermal calorimetry holds the cell at constant temperature and measures the heat it produces during normal charge/discharge cycling. This makes it a non-destructive technique suited to routine cell characterisation and ageing studies rather than safety/abuse testing.
References
See also: Calorimetry, What is Calorimetry?