Thermal insulation materials and methods thereof

#This application is a national stage filing under 35 U.S.C. 371 of PCT/CN2018/096648, filed Jul. 23, 2018, the disclosure of which is incorporated by reference in its entirety herein.

#Provided are articles for use in thermal insulation. The provided articles may be used as thermal insulators in automotive and aerospace applications, such as battery compartments for electric vehicles.

#The importance of thermal management in electric vehicles cannot be overstated. Temperature has a profound effect on the performance and serviceable lifetime of lithium ion batteries. Freezing temperatures decrease vehicle acceleration and impact driving range. On the other extreme, high temperatures are also detrimental because such temperatures can result in power fade and degrade battery life. Consumers have come to expect that such batteries will perform nominally for many years when used in a wide range of geographies and climates.

#FIG. 1 is a side cross-sectional views of a multilayer thermal insulator prior to being heat sealed;

#FIGS. 2-3 are side cross-sectional views of respective multilayer thermal insulators after being heat sealed; and

#FIG. 4 is a schematic diagram of an exemplary method of making the multilayer thermal insulator.

#Repeated use of reference characters in the specification and drawings is intended to represent the same or analogous features or elements of the disclosure. It is understood that numerous other modifications and embodiments can be devised by those skilled in the art, which fall within the scope and spirit of the principles of the disclosure. The figures are not drawn to scale.

#As used herein: “ambient conditions” means at 25° C. and 101.3 kPa pressure; “average” means number average, unless otherwise specified; “copolymer” refers to polymers made from repeat units of two or more different polymers and includes random, block and star (e.g. dendritic) copolymers; “average fiber diameter” of fibers in a non-woven core layer is determined by producing one or more images of the fiber structure, such as by using a scanning electron microscope; measuring the transverse dimension of clearly visible fibers in the one or more images resulting in a total number of fiber diameters; and calculating the average fiber diameter based on that total number of fiber diameters; “non-woven core layer” means a plurality of fibers characterized by entanglement or point bonding of the fibers to form a sheet or mat exhibiting a structure of individual fibers or filaments which are interlaid, but not in an identifiable manner as in a knitted fabric; “polymer” means a relatively high molecular weight material having a molecular weight of at least 10,000 g/mol; “size” refers to the longest dimension of a given object or surface; “substantially” means to a significant degree, as in an amount of at least 30%, 40, 50, 60, 70, 80, 90, 95, 96, 97, 98, 99, 99.5, 99.9, 99.99, or 99.999%, or 100%; and “thickness” means the distance between opposing sides of a layer or multilayer article.

#As used herein, the terms “preferred” and “preferably” refer to embodiments described herein that can afford certain benefits, under certain circumstances. However, other embodiments may also be preferred, under the same or other circumstances. Furthermore, the recitation of one or more preferred embodiments does not imply that other embodiments are not useful, and is not intended to exclude other embodiments from the scope of the invention.