Researchers at the Fraunhofer Institute for Energy Economics and Energy System Technology IEE and their industrial partners have made progress in the development of photovoltaic power converters in the "PV-MoVe" project funded by the German Federal Ministry for Economic Affairs and Climate Protection (BMWK). The aim of the project was to use innovative technologies to reduce the size, weight and cost of PV power converters without compromising their efficiency. This was achieved by actively reducing switching losses, enabling higher switching frequencies and thus leading to a more compact and cost-effective design.
The researchers focused on the use of special additional circuits to reduce switching losses in the power semiconductors. The developed circuits significantly increased the switching frequencies in a 50 kW PV converter, which led to a considerable reduction in switching losses. For silicon-based IGBT power semiconductors, the losses fell by up to 70 percent and for silicon carbide MOSFET power semiconductors by as much as 92 percent.
These results offer new perspectives for the application of PV power converters in various areas such as battery, drive or fuel cell inverters. The researchers at Fraunhofer IEE are now planning to test the developed technologies in an integrated system demonstrator to further verify their suitability for practical use. The PV-MoVe project, which ran from 2019 to 2023, was funded by the BMWK with a total of 2.8 million euros. It represents a step towards more efficient and cost-effective photovoltaic technologies.
Source: iee.fraunhofer.de
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