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Active cell balancing is the process of equalizing the State-of-Charge (SoC) of all cells in a series-connected battery pack via charge transfers. While several balancing architectures and equalization strategies exist in the literature, optimization of the circuit components in a balancing architecture has not been sufficiently studied so far. Intuitively, one would select components with low parasitic resistances to minimize the energy dissipation. However, as will be shown in this paper, this might not be an optimal choice in most situations. In this paper, we propose an optimization framework that performs an efficient design space exploration to identify the energy-efficient circuit configuration of a balancing architecture. Moreover, for the first time, we propose a methodology to obtain the optimal operating frequency of an active cell balancing architecture and a control circuit to maintain the operation at the optimal frequency. For this purpose, we derive a closed-form analytical model of the charge transfer process with which we obtain the performance metrics required for our framework. Case studies show that such optimally dimensioned active cell balancing architectures operated at the optimal frequency reduce the energy dissipation by approximately 49% compared to the intuitive approach of selecting components with least parasitic resistances. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

In this paper, a laser headlight power converter (LHPC) was developed to drive the InGaN-based blue beam laser diode (BBLD). The LHPC was composed of the four–switch step-up step-down converter (FSSUSDC), the FSSUSDC controller, and the current error compensator (CEC). When the BBLD dynamic resistance was increased under the high ambient air temperature, the FSSUSDC operated in the step-down mode, and the CEC employed the proportional-integral control, the BBLD driving current exhibited an ignition current spike, which could destroy the semiconductor material of the BBLD, resulting in optical output power decay. Therefore, a new four-gradation gain (FGG) control method was proposed to mitigate the ignition current spike of the BBLD. This paper presented the BBLD temperature characteristic, an analysis of the LHPC ignition current, a CEC compensation design, and an analysis and design of the FGG control. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This paper presents a new soft switching high voltage gain interleaved dc-dc converter with a three-windings coupled inductor for a fuel cell vehicle. Two interleaved and intercoupled boost cells are connected by the input parallel and output series (IPOS) configuration, realizing low input current ripple and high voltage gain simultaneously. All power switches can operate under soft switching conditions by only adding a simple auxiliary circuit composed of one auxiliary inductor and one power switch. Besides, the auxiliary inductor is coupled with the main inductors, which results in a rapid zero convergence of the auxiliary current and a small conduction loss of the auxiliary circuit. The operating principle, steady state characteristic, comparison with other converters, and parameter design are analyzed in this paper. Finally, the main characteristics of the proposed converter are verified by a 1-kW laboratory prototype. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Solid-state transformers (SST) are emerging technologies to replace the conventional low-frequency main transformer (MTR) in railway vehicles. In order to isolate the load side from the AC 25 kV high-voltage (HV) side and to reduce the whole size of the SST, HV insulation and high-frequency transformers should be used in DC/DC converters. Furthermore, due to the severe constraint of installation space and difficulty of heat dissipation management in the bottom of railway vehicles, high-power density and minimum transformer loss should be considered. To satisfy such design requirements of the proposed SST for railway vehicles, high efficiency integrated transformers, which inherently have leakage inductance, are proposed for dual-active-bridge (DAB) converters in this paper. In order to obtain appropriate equivalent leakage inductance for the DAB converters, a calculation methodology for the leakage inductance has been introduced and verified by simulation. Two separated winding structures in the center-core are adopted to improve the core loss, and appropriate winding turns with 60 kV HV insulation capability are selected, according to the proposed design procedure of the integrated transformers. In order to compare the proposed transformers with the conventional transformer having additional inductors and to verify the major characteristics of the transformers, two 125 kW proposed transformers and conventional transformers have been built and evaluated by an 250 kW SST module, operating at 10 kHz switching frequency. Under a 125 kW full-load condition, 99.7% transformer efficiency was obtained by the proposed integrated transformers, which are 4.7% smaller and 7.0% lighter than the conventional transformer. As a result, 26°C maximum temperature improvement has been obtained and 60k V HV insulation capability has been satisfied by the proposed integrated transformers. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Dynamic wireless charging (DWC) is one of the most promising and economical power supply solutions for electric vehicles (EVs), which can address range anxiety and downsize the volume of onboard batteries. To solve the null power phenomenon and transfer power pulsation phenomenon in DWC scheme, this paper proposes a new magnetic coupler array to implement continuous charging and reduce the output power variation. The transmitters are placed with a proper interval to eliminate the adjacent coupling and enlarge the coil array’s effective length. ANSYS Maxwell is utilized to demonstrate the finite element analysis (FEA) of the DWC system. A larger receiver coil is designed to significantly mitigate power pulsation and increase the magnetic coupling as the receiver moves along the array. With the well-designed receiver coil, the output power pulsation is $\pm$ 1.52 $\%$. For the high-power capacity scenario, a multilevel connected DC-DC converter is designed on the receiver side to regulate the transfer power. Besides, a passivity-based control (PBC) is developed for the receiving DC-DC converter based on the Euler-Lagrange (EL) model, and a current sharing compensator is employed to balance each phase inductor current. Finally, a 500- $\text{W}$ prototype is constructed, and experimental results are represented to validate the proposed optimized coil array and the proposed PBC method. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The DC-DC converter for fuel cell vehicles should be characterized by high-gain, low voltage stress, small size and high-efficiency. However, conventional two-level, three-level and cascaded boost converters cannot meet the requirements. A new non-isolated DC-DC converter with switched-capacitor and switched-inductor is proposed in this paper, which can obtain high-gain, wide input voltage range, low voltage stresses across components and common ground structure. In this paper, the operating principle, component parameters design, and comparisons with other high-gain converters are analyzed. Moreover, the state-space averaging method and small-signal modeling method are adopted to obtain the dynamic model of converter. Finally, simulation and experimental results verify the effectiveness of the proposed topology. The input voltage of the experimental prototype ranges from 25 V to 80 V. The rated output voltage is 200 V and rated power is 100W. The maximum efficiency is 93.1% under rated state. The proposed converter is suitable for fuel cell vehicles. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Automotive Ethernet is considered to be the backbone of future in-vehicle data communication. The IEEE 802.3bu standard specifies the use of one unshielded twisted pair of copper cables to simultaneously carry data and energy via Power over Data Lines (PoDL). One main challenge in combined data and energy transfer is the distortion of the data channel due to wideband interference from power signals present in the Automotive environment. This paper proposes the design of a novel enhanced coupling network for PoDL that features a noise cancelling current source controlled by an adaptive finite impulse response (FIR) filter for the active attenuation of interfering power signals. The concept of active attenuation was proven for a resistive network, an average attenuation of 92 dB was measured up to 120 MHz. Further analyses show that the cancellation performance heavily relies on low latency of the active filter. It is derived that the provided attenuation decreases exponentially with the frequency for a given time delay and a novel latency management concept called compressed summation is proposed. The approach maximizes the cancellation performance of the proposed filter architecture by exploiting the knowledge of the ideal filter function and effective latency to define the FIR-filter weights. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This paper presents the development of an electric-vehicle (EV) interior permanent-magnet synchronous motor (IPMSM) drive and its operation control. The power circuit of the established EV IPMSM drive consists of a two-leg interleaved bidirectional front-end dc/dc buck–boost converter and a three-phase inverter. The front-end converter can establish adjustable and boostable dc-link voltage for the motor drive to enhance its high-speed driving performance. It can also allow the battery bank to be charged from the motor during regenerative braking. Good current sharing control between converter modules and dc-link boosted voltage regulation response are preserved via the developed robust control scheme. Moreover, fast disturbance rejection response against the module fault and recovery is achieved. The comparative driving performance enhancements via dc-link voltage boosting and commutation instant tuning are conducted. Then, through proper setting and control, the established EV IPMSM drive possesses good driving performances, including starting, acceleration/deceleration, regenerative braking, and reversible operation characteristics. [ABSTRACT FROM PUBLISHER]

This paper proposes a novel double-grid-frequency-ripple-reducing technique for electric vehicle (EV) battery charger applications. In 1- $\phi$ EV battery chargers, due to double-frequency ripple, it is not possible to control the current using a single-power-stage approach. Hence, a two-stage approach is used. However, a bulky inductor and a capacitor are required to control the current, which adds to the system's weight and cost. The single-stage charging system described in this paper can charge the battery with almost ripple-free current without using a bulky electrolytic capacitor. At the same time, it can maintain high power factor (PF) and low total harmonic distortion on the input ac side. The proposed ripple compensation solution is realized by an innovative combination of boost and zeta converters connected in series with the battery charger, which reduces the filter capacitor value considerably. This facilitates the use of a film capacitor, which has a much longer life compared with an electrolytic capacitor. Similarly, the value of the filter inductor used in series with the battery is reduced significantly. Battery ripple current is not increased in the process; therefore, the battery life remains unaffected. Representative analytical, simulation, and experimental results are presented. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

LLC resonant converters are widely used in On-board Power Converter but the pumping voltage of traditional LLC converter is unavoidable under light-load conditions due to the existence of parasitic parameter. In this paper, an LLC resonant converter with damping split inductor is proposed to improve the light-load regulation capability. The original resonant inductor is divided into two parts in series. Then, a simple damping resistor connected on one part in parallel and the other part can be integrated into the transformer. Using damping split inductor, significant regulation improvements could be achieved under light-load conditions with not any change in control strategy and almost zero hardware cost. In addition, based on impedance analysis of the resonant tank, the effects of the proposed method are analyzed including voltage gain, soft switching characteristics, suppression of high frequency interference components, and system power loss. Moreover, the detailed design process and optimization conditions of the damping split inductor parameters are carefully illustrated. Eventually, the experimental results demonstrate the characteristics mentioned above for the 96 W prototype at the expense of a maximum increase in device loss of 0.85 W. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

To process the power in hybrid energy systems using a reduced part count, researchers have proposed several multiinput dc–dc power converter topologies to transfer power from different input voltage sources to the output. This paper proposes a novel bidirectional nonisolated multi-input converter (MIC) topology for hybrid systems to be used in electric vehicles composed of energy storage systems (ESSs) with different electrical characteristics. The proposed converter has the ability to control the power of ESSs by allowing active power sharing. The voltage levels of utilized ESSs can be higher or lower than the output voltage. The inductors of the converter are connected to a single switch; therefore, the converter requires only one extra active switch for each input, unlike its counterparts, hence resulting in reduced element count. The proposed MIC topology is compared with its counterparts concerning various parameters. It is analyzed in detail, and then, this analysis is validated by simulation and through a 1-kW prototype based on a battery/ultracapacitor hybrid ESS. [ABSTRACT FROM PUBLISHER]

Most fuel cell electric vehicles require wide voltage-gain DC–DC converters to increase and equalize the relatively low voltage of fuel cell stacks with DC link bus or energy-storage devices, such as supercapacitors or batteries. This paper proposes two new non-isolated DC–DC converters suitable for such applications, which can be extended to other electric vehicles as well. The proposed converters combine the main characteristics of both quadratic Boost and Ćuk converters, offering high step-up voltage and control simplicity using only one ground referenced active power switch. Additionally, the proposed topologies present reduced voltage stress across the active power switch when compared to other boost converters. Considerations about the design of the proposed converters will also be presented. Experimental results obtained using a laboratory prototype validate the effectiveness and feasibility of the proposed topologies and its suitability for fuel cell electric vehicles. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Research studies of vehicle-to-grid (V2G) are gaining more and more attention, because of its attractive features, such as, transferring bidirectional power between electric vehicles and grid, regulating grid voltage/frequency etc. This paper investigates the damping technique of the grid-connected inverter for a V2G application. As the silicon carbide (SiC) mosfet has obvious advantages in high-power-density inverters with a high switching frequency, an LLCL filter-based SiC mosfet inverter is designed to suppress the harmonics and increase the power density in this paper. By analyzing and comparing the suppression effects of four passive damping methods on the resonance peak of the LLCL filter, it is found that passive damping control strategy brings extra loss into the V2G system, and affects the performance of LLCL filter. An active damping control method is proposed to reduce losses and ensure better dynamic performance. The feasibility of the design scheme and performance are verified by simulations and experiments. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This paper presents a single-inductor multiple-input single-output (SI-MISO) boost converter with a deadbeat-based control method. The proposed deadbeat-based control has the capability to simultaneously conduct the power regulation from multiple inputs and the output voltage regulation for the SI-MISO boost converter. The advantages of the proposed method are less component count, lower system cost, compatibility for arbitrary number of inputs, fast response, and simplicity for implementation. Hence, the SI-MISO boost converter is a promising interface for the regulation of multiple energy sources as a standalone power system, which can be utilized in electric vehicle applications. To verify the performance of the proposed deadbeat-based control method, a laboratorial prototype of the SI-MISO boost converter is built. The steady-state and dynamic operations are investigated based on the prototype. The experimental results demonstrate that input power and output voltage of the SI-MISO boost converter can be effectively regulated by the proposed control method. The comprehensive comparison with the existing methods is conducted to further illustrate the advantages of the proposed deadbeat-based method. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

In order to match voltages between the fuel cell stacks and the DC link bus of fuel cell vehicles, a single-switch Boost dc–dc converter with diode-capacitor modules is proposed in this paper. The capacitors are charged in parallel and discharged in series. The wide voltage-gain range can be obtained by using a simple structure. In addition, the basic operating principles, the extended stages, the fault tolerant operation, and steady-state characteristics of the converter are analyzed and presented in this paper, and the small-signal model is also derived. A 400 V, 1.6 kW experimental prototype is developed, and the wide voltage-gain range (3.3 ∼ 8) is demonstrated with a maximum efficiency at 97.25%. The experimental results validate the effectiveness and feasibility of the proposed converter and its suitability as a power interface for fuel cell vehicles. [ABSTRACT FROM PUBLISHER]

This paper presents the feasibility study of variable inductor (VI)-based bidirectional dc–dc converter for applications with a wide range of load variations such as electric vehicles. An additional winding is introduced to the conventional power inductor to inject a control current for adjusting the permeability of magnetic cores. This has significant merits in controlling the current ripple and enhancing the current handling capability of power inductors, thereby reducing the size of magnetic components and improving the performance. For current values, twice and three times the rated current, the current ripple is reduced by 40.90 % and 36.10 %, respectively. Nonetheless, this device requires a precisely controlled dc-current. As such, a small current controlled, low-power and low-cost buck converter is built to power up the auxiliary winding. To improve the reliability and robustness of the VI, an integrated closed loop control that enables the control of the main converter and the auxiliary converter is also implemented and tested in real time to test the viability of the VI. [ABSTRACT FROM PUBLISHER]

In this paper, a two-stage onboard battery charger is analyzed for plug-in electric vehicles (PEVs). An interleaved boost topology is employed in the first stage for power factor correction (PFC) and to reduce total harmonic distortion (THD). In the second stage, a full-bridge LLC-based multiresonant converter is adopted for galvanic isolation and dc/dc conversion. Design considerations are discussed, focusing on reducing the charger volume and optimizing the conversion efficiency over the wide battery-pack voltage range. A detailed design procedure is provided for a 1-kW prototype, charging the battery with an output voltage range of 320–420 V from 110-V 60-Hz single-phase grid. Experimental results show that the first-stage PFC converter achieves THD of less than 4% and a power factor higher than 0.99, and the second-stage LLC converter operates with 95.4% peak efficiency and good overall efficiency over wide output voltage ranges. [ABSTRACT FROM PUBLISHER]

Due to an increasing in-vehicle electric load demand, a new 48-V electric system architecture proposed by German premier car manufacturers has been gaining increasing attention recently for electrified vehicles. In this paper, a multiple-voltage bus converter for the 48-V and existing 12-V dual supply system, providing additional flexible dc bus voltages, is proposed. The proposed converter can provide a dual flexible dc voltage bus and an additional dependent voltage bus while simultaneously managing the 12-V supply net using only one single-leg switch pole and a diode. The additional dc voltage buses will provide more options to accommodate variable electric load components in a vehicle, improving their power density. Due to the multiple control objectives, the single-leg pole requires a multimode switching strategy to regulate the additional bus voltages. To improve the onboard vehicle system reliability and performance, an impedance network structure is implemented in the converter to obtain a dead-time-free pulsewidth modulation (PWM). Simulation and experimental results are presented to verify the feasibility and effectiveness of the proposed structure and control method. [ABSTRACT FROM PUBLISHER]

An onboard charger is responsible for charging the battery pack in a plug-in hybrid electric vehicle (PHEV). In this paper, a 3.3-kW two-stage battery charger design is presented for a PHEV application. The objective of the design is to achieve high efficiency, which is critical to minimize the charger size, charging time, and the amount and cost of electricity drawn from the utility. The operation of the charger power converter configuration is provided in addition to a detailed design procedure. The mechanical packaging design and key experimental results are provided to verify the suitability of the proposed charger power architecture. [ABSTRACT FROM PUBLISHER]

Electric vehicle technology has been adopting fuel cells (FCs) for hybrid applications over the past few years. Therefore, the development of advanced power electronic systems for the integration of fuel cells with on-board energy management is fundamental for achieving high-performance systems. An FC for vehicular applications is usually a low-voltage current-source like device that produces electricity and heat directly from input hydrogen and oxygen. Most often, it is required that the FCs be stacked for high-voltage dc-link in order to supply the input power for the drivetrain and electric motor drive system. The FC has a nonlinear nature, and it must be controlled to operate in the high-efficiency operating range. Hybrid electric vehicles have physical constraints such as volume and weight under limited cost and expected lifetime. There is a need for high-voltage input/output ratio of dc-dc boost converters to be connected between the FC to the motor drive dc-link. In addition, it is necessary to have low input ripple at the dc-dc boost converter in order to maximize the FC lifetime, and the traditional dc-dc boost converter topologies have poor performance on these specifications. This paper proposes a new dc-dc converter family of topologies aimed at improving the application to electric vehicle power control. This family is defined as floating-interleaving boost converters (FIBCs). The paper will thoroughly show analysis and experimental verification of FIBC's, and they will be compared with conventional boost converter characteristics. The paper supports how performance figures related to the passive components, i.e., the inductor and capacitor, will have better volume and weight, extremely low input current ripple, and improved efficiency and transfer ratio. The analysis presented in this paper shows how to choose the most suitable topology in order to achieve the desired specifications. The selected topology is fully validated experimentally using advanced nonlinear sliding mode control, which has the additional feature of operating even in faulty conditions. [ABSTRACT FROM PUBLISHER]

The essential features of a DC–DC converter for fuel cell vehicle are to ensure the higher voltage gain to meet out the higher DC link voltage demand, continuous input current to improve the life span of the fuel cell, presence of common grounding to avoid electromagnetic interference issue and lower voltage stress with reduced components. This paper presents a high voltage gain DC–DC converter by combining the switched capacitor and quasi switched boost network modules. The proposed high voltage gain converter provides the continuous input current, lower voltage stress, utilizes a fewer number of elements and common grounding feature. The operating characteristics, steady-state analysis both in continuous current mode (CCM) and discontinuous current mode (DCM), comparative analysis with contemporary converters are discussed. The theoretical claimed analysis is validated by the simulation and experimental study. The proposed converter is operated for 200 W output power rating and tested for providing the voltage gain in the range of 5–8 times the input voltage gain by varying the input voltage from 25 V–40 V. The efficiency of the proposed converter is also reported for different output power rating which is in the range 91.3%–93.7%. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

High-power boost converters offer significant benefits to hybrid and electric vehicles, because higher-voltage propulsion power equates to lower motor losses. However, the converters themselves must have high efficiency and high power density in order to make the system-level trade-off beneficial. Thus, this paper presents an optimized design process of high power multi-phase interleaved bidirectional boost converters. In order to achieve a fast and accurate analysis and design, a generalized method is developed for the calculations of required phase inductance and output capacitance. In addition, a genetic algorithm (GA) optimization method is implemented for the inductor design. Using the proposed design process, a 3-phase 60 kW interleaved converter is designed and tested using paralleled SiC MOSFETS. The converter achieves peak efficiency of 99.2% at 10 kW and is $>$ 98% efficiency from 5% to 100% load. The resulting power density is 9.4 kW/L, which can be further improved to 12.2 kW/L with alternate terminal connectors. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

A new single-switch high step-up dc–dc converter is proposed, in this paper, for fuel cell vehicles. The proposed topology utilizes an L2C3D2 network to obtain high voltage gain and reduce the voltage stress on the power switch. Additionally, the proposed converter has a universal input voltage in order to suit the soft output characteristics of the fuel cell. Comprehensive analyses of the steady-state operation in continuous conduction mode and discontinuous conduction mode, and design considerations of the proposed converter are given. Finally, a 400 V/1.6 kW scaled-down prototype is developed to validate the effectiveness and feasibility of the proposed converter. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

In order to use the dynamic low-voltage fuel cell stack in a fuel cell vehicle with a constant high voltage (400 V) dc bus, a capacitor-clamped H-type boost dc-dc converter with a wide voltage gain is proposed in this paper. In the input-voltage side, a capacitor clamped H-type structure is adopted to reduce input current ripple, avoid narrow-pulse of pulsewidth modulation voltage waveforms, and decrease the conduction loss of power switches; while in the output-voltage side, a switched-capacitor structure is adopted to achieve high voltage gain and decrease the voltage stress of all power semiconductors and capacitors. The operating principle, characteristic, control strategy, parameters design, and comparison with other converters are analyzed, and a 400 W prototype is developed. As a result, the converter can transform low-voltage from 25 V to 70 V in to 400 V with a wide voltage-gain range, which maximum efficiency is 94.72%. The experimental results also validate the aforementioned characteristics of the proposed converter and the correctness of theoretical analysis. This converter is suitable to serve as power interface for fuel cell vehicles. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Silicon carbide (SiC)-based switching devices provide significant performance improvements in many aspects, including lower power dissipation, higher operating temperatures, and faster switching, compared with conventional Si devices. However, tradeoffs in efficiency, size, and weight between Si- and SiC-based converters are still unclear in the literature. In this paper, a bidirectional dc–dc converter that is suitable for hybrid or electric vehicle application is studied based on three sets of device combinations, e.g., all-silicon [conventional silicon insulated-gate bipolar transistors (IGBTs) and silicon PN diodes], hybrid (silicon IGBTs with SiC Schottky diodes), and all-SiC (SiC metal–oxide–semiconductor field-effect transistors with SiC Schottky diodes). At the switching frequency of 20 kHz, comparative analyses regarding the power loss reduction of power devices and efficiency improvements are carried out for the converters. Possible size and weight reduction is also investigated by increasing the operating frequencies of hybrid and all-SiC converters while reducing the capacitance and inductance values. [ABSTRACT FROM PUBLISHER]

This paper presents the design guideline of a bidirectional isolated Ćuk converter with an active-snubber circuit, which is used as a cell level tester for multiple automotive dc energy storage devices (ESDs), such as ultracapacitors, Li-ion batteries, and NiMH batteries. The converter interfaces those automotive dc ESD cells with 24-V dc systems, and it realizes bidirectional power flow with two main switches. Based on the ratings of those dc ESD cells, the designed converter operates at a very low voltage range, i.e., from 1.5 to 6 V, with current as high as 300 A. The detailed operation principle and major features, such as soft switching and energy recovery, are analyzed under continuous current mode. Based on the analysis, the design guideline of the dc–dc converter is presented. A 1.2-kW laboratory prototype has been built and tested with full power rating. Both simulation and experimental results are presented to verify the analysis. [ABSTRACT FROM PUBLISHER]

The current research trend to increase the power density of power electronics interfaces in automotive applications is the cost-effective integration of power converters. This paper proposes a reduced-part integrated power electronics interface that is capable of charging the battery and adjusting the voltage levels of a battery and a dc link during propulsion and regenerative braking. In the proposed topology, one inductor is shared between a dc/dc converter and a charger, eliminating the need for an additional magnetic component for the charging stage. A charge nonlinear-carrier control (NLC) method, which reduces the feedback circuitry, is adopted, and different nonlinear reference voltage waveforms are generated for each half-cycle of the grid to ensure a unity power factor and stable operation. To verify the concept, a 750-W prototype has been built and tested for each operation mode. [ABSTRACT FROM PUBLISHER]

Plug-in electric vehicles (PEVs) are equipped with onboard level-1 or level-2 chargers for home overnight or office daytime charging. In addition, off-board chargers can provide fast charging for traveling long distances. However, off-board high-power chargers are bulky, expensive, and require comprehensive evolution of charging infrastructures. An integrated onboard charger capable of fast charging of PEVs will combine the benefits of both the conventional onboard and off-board chargers, without additional weight, volume, and cost. In this paper, an innovative single-phase integrated charger, using the PEV propulsion machine and its traction converter, is introduced. The charger topology is capable of power factor correction and battery voltage/current regulation without any bulky add-on components. Ac machine windings are utilized as mutually coupled inductors, to construct a two-channel interleaved boost converter. The circuit analyses of the proposed technology, based on a permanent magnet synchronous machine (PMSM), are discussed in details. Experimental results of a 3-kW proof-of-concept prototype are carried out using a \textrm220-V{\rm{rms}}, 3-phase, 8-pole PMSM. A nearly unity power factor and 3.96% total harmonic distortion of input ac current are acquired with a maximum efficiency of 93.1%. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This paper presents the design and control of a high-efficiency multiphase dc–dc converter for a truck auxiliary power unit (APU) fed by a fuel-cell stack. The power-stage design methodology and the operation of the designed power stage used to achieve high efficiency are described in detail. To operate the designed converter as a truck APU, the mode transfer control scheme, where smooth transitions of the voltage and current control modes are necessary, is proposed, and the current controller design procedure is described. A 5-kW four-phase dc–dc converter prototype is built with the proposed power-stage configuration, and the proposed control strategy is applied to control the dc–dc converter. The efficiency of the converter is more than 99.5% at near 10% load and above 98% from 10% to 100% load range. Simulations and experimental results are provided to verify the feasibilities of dc–dc converter operation and the proposed control strategy in the truck APU application. [ABSTRACT FROM PUBLISHER]

In this paper, a phase-shifted semi-bridgeless boost power-factor-corrected (PFC) converter is proposed to simplify the current-sensing technique for the semi-bridgeless PFC converter. The converter features high efficiency at light loads and low ac input lines, which is critical to minimize the charger size, charging time, and amount and cost of electricity drawn from the utility. The converter is applicable for automotive levels I and II but is ideally suited for level-I residential charging applications. A detailed converter description and steady-state operation analysis of this converter is presented. Experimental results of a prototype boost converter, converting the universal ac input voltage to 400 V dc at 3.4 kW, are given, and the results are compared with an interleaved boost converter to verify the proof of concept and the reported analytical work. [ABSTRACT FROM PUBLISHER]

The impending global energy crisis has opened up new opportunities for the automotive industry to meet the ever-increasing demand for cleaner and fuel-efficient vehicles. This has necessitated the development of drivetrains that are either fully or partially electrified in the form of electric and plug-in hybrid electric vehicles (EVs and HEVs), respectively, which are collectively addressed as plug-in EVs (PEVs). PEVs in general are equipped with larger on-board storage and power electronics for charging or discharging the battery, in comparison with HEVs. The extent to which PEVs are adopted significantly depends on the nature of the charging solution utilized. In this paper, a comprehensive topological survey of the currently available PEV charging solutions is presented. PEV chargers based on the nature of charging (conductive or inductive), stages of conversion (integrated single stage or two stages), power level (level 1, 2, or 3), and type of semiconductor devices utilized (silicon, silicon carbide, or gallium nitride) are thoroughly reviewed in this paper. [ABSTRACT FROM PUBLISHER]

A nonisolated single-stage on-board charger for electric vehicles has been proposed to increase system efficiency and power density in previous works. However, its ability to achieve high efficiency is limited by variations in the electric utility and battery, especially during the step-down operation. This paper proposes an advanced control algorithm that improves system efficiency in the step-down mode by controlling each switch asymmetrically using a phase-shift control. The proposed algorithm consists of only one controller, which prevents transient states from causing variations in the controller. The algorithm decreases the magnitude and ripple of the inductor current, which improves the charging efficiency by approximately 4.1% over at the 3.7-kW full load that of the conventional algorithm in the step-down mode, and measured total harmonic distortion and power factor are 3.2% and 0.995, respectively. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This paper proposes a novel integrated synchronous buck converter for the auxiliary power supply system of electric vehicles, which achieves multiple independently regulated outputs with reduced switching components in comparison with the conventional separate buck converters. In order to obtain a better understanding of the proposed converter, operational principle and performance characteristics of a simplified dual-output buck converter are introduced in detail, as an example. The analysis shows that zero-voltage-switching operation and lower conduction losses could be attained. In addition, its dynamic behavior is similar to the conventional buck converter and thus the controller design is simple. Finally, experimental results based on a prototype circuit in which two inductors are integrated into one magnetic core to achieve further reduced cost are demonstrated to verify the advantages. [ABSTRACT FROM PUBLISHER]

An active balancing method based on two flyback converters is proposed for series-connected battery pack. Balanced energy can be transferred between the whole battery and any single cell. The proposed topology reduces the number of energy storage components, the volume and the cost of the balancing system. And it has the characteristics of fast balancing speed and high balancing efficiency. Based on the topology, a dual-objective hybrid control strategy is proposed, which can reduce the highest voltage and boost the lowest voltage in the charging or discharging process of the cells in one sampling period, so as to improve the balancing speed. Simulation and experimental results show that the proposed method has a good balancing effect and can significantly improve the consistency of series battery pack. This work is potentially significant in terms of improved reliability of battery packs and savings of costs and lives in safety-critical applications. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This paper suggests a hybrid pulsewidth-modulation (PWM) dc/dc converter for an electric vehicle (EV) on-board charger (OBC). It is composed of a full-bridge (FB) converter and a resonant converter with secondary resonance tank (SRT). They are coupled in a single transformer so that any power distribution problem that causes a size increase in the transformer can be solved. Dual power flow of the proposed charger provides an increase in charger gain and a reduction of turn-off voltage spikes of the rectifying diodes caused by transformer leakage inductance and diode junction capacitance. These characteristics help reduce diode loss and remove dissipative snubber circuitry. In addition, this structure has the additional advantage of output inductor size due to the reduction of voltage variation applied to the inductor. The feasibility of the proposed charger is verified with a 6.6-kW prototype implemented by a design procedure. [ABSTRACT FROM PUBLISHER]

An investigation is described into the optimization of multi-phase, high power, bi-directional DC-DC interleaved converters suitable for Electric Vehicle (EV) applications. Two dual-interleaved topologies were considered initially for the optimization, the main difference being the magnetic devices: either discrete inductors (DI) or an Interphase Transformer (IPT). The comparison used a comprehensive multi-objective design optimization procedure for an 80 kW case study. High performance inductors comprising a split-core structure and dual-foil windings to reduce losses, and a 180 °C core, enabled the DI to be competitive with IPT in terms of power density and efficiency. The optimized designs are validated experimentally with an 80 kW bi-directional SiC DC-DC converter, achieving a power density of 31.4 kW/L and specific power of 15.7 kW/kg. The study is then extended to 100-kW three and four-phase interleaved topologies. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Plug-in hybrid electric vehicles (PHEVs) will play a vital role in future sustainable transportation systems due to their potential in terms of energy security, decreased environmental impact, improved fuel economy, and better performance. Moreover, new regulations have been established to improve the collective gas mileage, cut greenhouse gas emissions, and reduce dependence on foreign oil. This paper primarily focuses on two major thrust areas of PHEVs. First, it introduces a grid-friendly bidirectional alternating current/direct current ac/dc–dc/ac rectifier/inverter for facilitating vehicle-to-grid (V2G) integration of PHEVs. Second, it presents an integrated bidirectional noninverted buck–boost converter that interfaces the energy storage device of the PHEV to the dc link in both grid-connected and driving modes. The proposed bidirectional converter has minimal grid-level disruptions in terms of power factor and total harmonic distortion, with less switching noise. The integrated bidirectional dc/dc converter assists the grid interface converter to track the charge/discharge power of the PHEV battery. In addition, while driving, the dc/dc converter provides a regulated dc link voltage to the motor drive and captures the braking energy during regenerative braking. [ABSTRACT FROM PUBLISHER]

The cell voltage imbalance of series-connected energy storage cells, such as supercapacitors (SCs) and lithium-ion cells, causes premature deterioration and a decrease in the available energies of the cells. Various equalization techniques have been developed for diminishing such imbalances. However, since the number of switches, sensors, and/or multiwinding transformers present in conventional equalizers is directly proportional to the number of series connections of the cells, the circuit complexity and cost of the equalizers are prone to increase with the number of series connections. In this paper, single-switch cell voltage equalizers using multistacked buck-boost converters, such as the single-ended primary inductor converter (SEPIC), Zeta, and Ćuk converters, are proposed. These equalizers consist of passive components and a single switch, significantly reducing the complexity of the circuit when compared with that of conventional equalizers. In addition, when the proposed equalizers operate in discontinuous conduction mode, feedback control is not required to limit currents flowing through cells and circuit components. The proposed equalizers are compared with conventional topologies in terms of the number of active and passive components required. Operating analyses were conducted under both cell-voltage-balanced and -imbalanced conditions. Experimental equalization tests were performed for four series-connected SCs using the SEPIC-based single-switch equalizer. The energies of the series-connected SCs were preferentially redistributed by the equalizer to the cell(s) having the lowest voltage, resulting in the elimination of the cell voltage imbalance and subsequent uniformity of the cell voltages. [ABSTRACT FROM PUBLISHER]

This paper presents a predictive control-based fuel-cell hybrid electric vehicle system. Employing hybrid power sources, an ultracapacitor (UC), and a battery, the hybrid system maximizes the energy efficiency and protects the battery while achieving faster torque response based on predictive controllers residing in the boost converter, UC manager, and motor drive. The predictive controller implemented in the brushless dc (BLDC) motor drive improves the motor current response. Overall, the proposed hybrid system improves the dc-bus current response, and, hence, motor torque response, compared with a conventional proportional-integral (PI) controller-based system. The effectiveness of the proposed system has been verified through simulation and experiment. [ABSTRACT FROM PUBLISHER]

A detailed small-signal analysis and a closed-loop control design of a naturally commutated bidirectional current-fed dual active bridge (CFDAB) dc/dc converter are presented. The proposed converter is suitable for a fuel cell vehicle (FCV) between a traction inverter and batteries. State-space averaging technique is used to derive the small-signal model. Based on the derived small-signal model, a closed two-loop controller is designed and implemented on mixed signal (analog and digital) processor Cypress programmable system-on-chip (PSoC) 5. A complete design procedure is presented. Simulation results using PSIM 9.0.4 and experimental waveforms from a 250-W prototype with the designed controller are shown to verify the stability of the control system. Experimental results for step changes in load clearly show satisfactory transient performance of the converter and validate the closed two-loop design. It is suitable for energy storage, interfacing two dc buses of different voltages in a microgrid and a solar photovoltaic power system to boost a low-voltage panel up to the peak of the utility voltage. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Conventional current-fed resonant converter suffers from high turn-off loss over wide range of fuel-cell voltage. To alleviate this problem, we propose high voltage gain current-fed resonant converter that achieves almost ZVS turn-off over a wide range of voltage gain. By employing a bidirectional switch across center nodes of the voltage doubler and corresponding modulation, the presented converter achieved almost ZVS at the turn-off instant; this trait significantly increases the power conversion efficiency even under high frequency operation. The inherent boost function of the current doubler, an additional boosting operation using a bidirectional switch, and double boosting of the voltage doubler enable the presented converter to achieve high voltage gain without having to use a transformer that has a high turns-ratio. Moreover, 180 $^\circ$ phase interleaving reduces the input current ripple to zero. The steady-state operation is analyzed comprehensively, and design considerations of the proposed converter are given. Finally, a prototype with input of 48-72 V, output of 380 V, and rated power of 1 kW is developed to validate the effectiveness and feasibility of the proposed converter. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

A series of integrated equalizers based on joint buck-boost (BB) and switched-capacitor (SC) converters are proposed for balancing the voltages of series-connected battery packs. All these equalizers realize the any-cells-to-any-cells (AC2AC) equalization mode without increasing the count of MOSFETs and drivers. Corresponding operational principles are analyzed and the expressions of balancing currents are derived by analytical methods and verified by experimental waveforms. According to the comparative balancing experiments for four and six series-connected Li-ion cells, one proposed CBB-PCSC equalizer, which achieves the dual AC2AC balancing modes through the integration of both coupled buck-boost (CBB) and parallel-connected switched-capacitor (PCSC) converters, leads to the highest balancing speed and efficiency. Moreover, compared with several conventional equalizers, this CBB-PCSC topology also has the compact size and low cost, making it become a well-performing integrated topology for automotive battery voltages equalization. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This work deals with the design and implementation of a new charger for a battery-operated electric vehicle (EV) with power factor improvement at the front end. In the proposed configuration, the conventional diode converter at the source end of existing EV battery charger is eliminated with the modified Landsman power factor correction (PFC) converter. The PFC converter is cascaded to a flyback isolated converter, which yields the EV battery control to charge it, first in constant current mode then switching to constant voltage mode. The proposed PFC converter is controlled using single sensed entity to achieve the robust regulation of dc-link voltage as well as to ensure the unity power factor operation. The proposed topology offers improved power quality, low device stress, and low input and output current ripple with low input current harmonics when compared to the conventional one. Moreover, to demonstrate the conformity of the proposed charger to an IEC 61000-3-2 standard, a prototype is built and tested to charge a 48 V EV battery of 100 Ah capacity, under transients in input voltage. The performance of the charger is found satisfactory for all the cases. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]