Protecting electric vehicles against ground impact is essential for passenger safety and product reliability, as excessive deformation of battery cells can have severe consequences. Battery packs of electric vehicles are therefore often equipped with energy‑absorbing structures between the battery cells and the lower housing to limit cell deformation. Designing these protective structures, however, is challenging because energy absorption and cell deformation must be carefully balanced to satisfy all system‑level requirements. The resulting trade‑offs often lead to time‑consuming design iterations. Computing so‑called solution spaces (decoupled target ranges) for individual components of protective structures based on system‑level requirements enables independent design work and increases design freedom for different stakeholders. To apply solution space identification to the mechanical design of protective structures in electric battery packs, we have developed an approach comprising three main elements. First, a mechanical surrogate model of protective structures in battery packs that are subject to bottom impact. Second, a collection of simplified material models, including a parametrized tri-linear material model that captures the mechanical behaviour of crushable foam-like structures under compressive loading. Third, a procedure for identifying solution spaces when considering different classes of materials for which target ranges shall be identified. The complete approach is applied to the design of a modern battery pack incorporating a protective support structure on its bottom surface. The results demonstrate that solution space engineering can be used effectively to improve the design process of electric battery packs and, consequently, to enable more robust and resource efficient products.