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Lithium-ion battery systems are becoming a major component in numerous applications. The thermal behaviour of cells should be monitored for many reasons. In this paper, the investigation of the energy balance for lithium-ion battery system is described. The electrothermal model allows to describe heat generation and heat dissipation processes in all components of a battery pack (BP). Moreover, this model can be easily adapted for bigger, modular battery systems, since the primitive in the proposed model is a single cell. A method to determine the energy balance through experimental investigations and to validate the model is also proposed. Four types of BPs with sixteen cylindrical 18650 lithium-ion cells were tested. The influence of both busbar material and the presence of heatsinks on the BP thermal conditions was investigated. The results show that the heat accumulated in cells can be decreased by 20% and the cell temperature lowered by 8 °C if additional elements are used in a BP. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]