Volvo patents counterfeit battery detection tech

Counterfeit car batteries can pose serious health and safety risks, including fires that can be life-threatening and destroy vehicles and property and environmental damage due to shoddy and polluting raw materials.

They also pose a major problem for manufacturers, with a 2018 EUIPO report suggesting that counterfeit batteries and tyres cost EU businesses around $2.5bn a year.

Carmaker Volvo has responded to the threat by developing a way to detect if counterfeit batteries are installed into one of its vehicles in the aftermarket, using sensor data monitored by a vehicle's battery management system. The system would detect deviations in the data of the vehicle battery cell can be compared to data generated using a large number of reference cells.

"By knowing whether vehicle battery cells are counterfeited or not, safe operating conditions can be assured according to the vehicle manufacturer's safety and regulatory standards," according to the patent. 

Other efforts to combat the trade in counterfeit batteries are also in the works. Last year, the EU adopted a new regulation mandating that – by 2026 – all electrical and industrial batteries with a capacity of over 2 kWh will have to bear a unique serial number to allow traceability.

The abstract of Volvo's patent appears below:

Vehicle battery cell counterfeit detection

Abstract: A computer system includes processing circuitry configured to receive sensor-obtained battery data from at least one battery cell being monitored by a battery management system of a vehicle, the at least one battery cell being of a particular type; obtain battery reference data from a plurality of battery reference cells of different types; compare the sensor-obtained battery data to the battery reference data, wherein a battery cell modeler is configured to perform the comparing by processing the sensor-obtained battery data and the battery reference data; and based on the comparing, determine counterfeit characteristics data indicating that said particular type of the at least one battery cell deviates from a selected type among said plurality of reference battery cells of different types.

(US 20240369638 A1)