looking under the hood of my wife's Mazda 3 today and noticed that not only is most of the engine covered, but also the battery is in a completely enclosed box, well except it has a scoop to channel air into the box. the scoop looks almost like out OEM intake scoop....

So what's up with this? Is there an advantage to enclosing the battery in a plastic box and then feeding cool air into the compartment? If so, might want to do this on the max....

 

I think they do it so the whole engine compartment looks better. There is no advantage in doing anything to the battery. The scoop/vent could be there so that if any gases are leaked from the battery they don't build up, although that is also rather remote.