A Single Stage Integrated Bidirectional AC/DC and

DC/DC Converter for Plug-In Hybrid Electric

Vehicles
Hao Chen1, Student Member, IEEE, Xiaochen Wang1, Member, IEEE, and Alireza Khaligh2, Senior Member, IEEE
1
Electrical and Computer Engineering Department; Illinois Institute of Technology; Chicago, IL 60616
2
Electrical and Computer Engineering Department; University of Maryland; College Park, MD, 20742

Abstract—The add-on battery pack in plug-in hybrid electric modes, i.e. plug-in charging of add-on battery, Vehicle-to-
vehicles can be charged from an AC outlet, feed power back to Grid (V2G) mode, boost operation from add-on battery to
the grid, provide power for electric traction, and capture high voltage bus of the PHEV, and buck operation for
regenerative energy when braking. Conventionally, three-stage regenerative charging of add-on battery.
bidirectional converter interfaces are used to fulfil these
functions. In this paper, a single stage integrated converter is
proposed based on direct AC/DC conversion theory. The
proposed converter eliminates the full bridge rectifier, reduces
the number of semiconductor switches and high current
inductors, and improves the conversion efficiency.

Index Terms—Plug-in Hybrid Electric Vehicle, Bidirectional

Converter, Direct AC/DC Conversion.

I. INTRODUCTION (a)

Power Electronics interfaces play an inevitable role in the

functionality of plug-in hybrid electric vehicles (PHEV) [1].
Usually, a bidirectional AC/DC charger is used to charge the
battery and inject power back to the grid. In Vehicle-to-Grid
(V2G) mode of operation, the AC outlet converter needs a
battery charger with power factor correction (PFC) [2]-[9]. In
addition, a bidirectional DC/DC converter with proper
charging-discharging profile is required to transfer energy
between the battery and the electric traction system [8]. (b)
As demonstrated in Fig. 1 (a), the conventional energy
storage charger of a PHEV, is composed of three stages. The
first stage is a bidirectional AC/DC rectifier/inverter. The
second stage is a bidirectional DC/DC converter which
regulates the battery charging current or feeds power back to
the grid. The third stage is another bidirectional converter
which boosts the voltage of battery to the high voltage DC-bus
of the propulsion inverter. Researchers have investigated
integrated topologies, shown in Fig. 1 (b), which have led to
(c)
integration of the second stage and the third stage converters
[8]. In compare to conventional converters, two-stage Fig. 1. Converter topologies for PHEV. (a) Conventional three stages
topology has less number of inductors and transducers, which converter. (b) Integrated converter proposed in paper [8]. (c) Proposed single
reduces the cost and weight of the power electronic stage converter
components; however, due to the existence of more
semiconductor switches and diodes, it has slightly lower II. PROPOSED INTEGRATED CONVERTER
conversion efficiency. Fig. 1 (c) shows the single stage Fig. 2 shows the two alternative charger topologies
integrated converter proposed in this paper, which eliminates employing direct AC/DC conversion. The first topology,
the full bridge rectifier by utilizing a novel direct AC/DC named topology I, involves nine semiconductor switches and
conversion. In compare to the conventional topologies, it has one mechanical switch. This topology can be used for the
less number of inductors and switches, and higher conversion applications with any battery voltage levels. Fig. 2 (a) shows
efficiency. The proposed converter can be operated in four the topology I with IGBTs; and Fig. 2 (b) demonstrates the

978-1-61284-247-9/11/$26.00 ©2011 IEEE

 (a) (b)

(c) (d)

Fig. 2. Proposed integrated converter: (a) Topology I with IGBTs, (b) Topology I with MOSFETs, (c) Topology II with IGBTs, (d) Topology II with MOSFETs.

Table I. Switch combinations for each operation mode of topology I with IGBT
Operation Mode
I II III IV
Switches Positive Negative Positive Negative
Buck- Buck- Buck- Buck- Boost Buck
Buck Boost Buck Boost
Boost Boost Boost Boost
Q1 OFF OFF OFF PWM PWM ON ON OFF OFF OFF
Q2 PWM PWM ON OFF OFF OFF OFF ON OFF OFF
Q3 OFF OFF OFF OFF PWM OFF PWM OFF PWM OFF
Q4 ON ON OFF OFF OFF OFF OFF OFF OFF ON
Q5 PWM OFF PWM OFF OFF OFF OFF ON OFF OFF
Q6 OFF OFF OFF OFF PWM PWM ON OFF ON OFF
Q7 OFF OFF OFF ON OFF OFF OFF OFF OFF OFF
Q8 OFF OFF OFF OFF OFF OFF OFF PWM OFF OFF
Q9 OFF OFF OFF OFF OFF OFF OFF OFF OFF PWM
S OFF OFF OFF OFF OFF OFF OFF OFF ON ON

topology I with MOSFETs. In topology Fig. 2 (a), Q1, Q2, Q3,
Q4, Q7, Q8 are discrete IGBT switches, while Q5, Q6, Q9 are
the co-pack IGBTs which includes an anti-parallel diode. S is
a mechanical switch, which is turned off during add-on battery
plug-in charging mode and V2G mode, and is turned on
during electric propulsion.
Since most of the MOSFETs in market include an intrinsic
body diode, topology Fig. 2 (b) is slightly different than
topology Fig. 2 (a). Q1 and Q2, Q3 and Q4, Q7 and Q8, are
connected in series in Fig. 2 (b) to realize bidirectional control,
while they are connected in parallel in Fig. 2 (a) to realize
higher efficiency. The second topology, named topology II,
includes seven semiconductor switches and two mechanical
switches. This topology can be used for the applications where
the battery voltage is always higher than the peak value of the
AC input voltage. Topology Fig. 2 (c) is with IGBTs and Fig.
2 (d) is the modified circuit with MOSFETs. The switches S1
and S2 can be integrated into one switch mechanically. They
are turned off simultaneously in battery plug-in charging
mode, and turned on in electric traction mode. Due to the
similarity of the four topologies, only topology I with IGBTs
is analysed in this paper. All of the switch combinations for
 this topology are listed in table I.
A. Mode I – Plug-in Charging of Add-on Battery
In this mode, the converter works as a non-inverting buck-
boost converter when the AC input is positive, and operates as
an inverting buck-boost converter when the AC input is
negative. Fig. 3 shows the operation of the converter in this
mode, where the red line is for inductor charging and blue line
is for inductor discharging.

(a)

(a)

(b)

Fig. 4. Mode II – Vehicle-to-grid (V2G): (a) Positive AC voltage and (b)

Negative AC voltage.

(b)
Fig. 3. Mode I – Plug-in charging mode of add-on battery: (a) Positive AC
input and (b) Negative AC input.
When the AC input is positive, Q1, Q3, Q6, Q7, Q8, Q9,
and S are turned off, Q4 is turned on, Q2 and Q5 are
controlled by the same PWM signals. The integrated converter
operates as a non-inverting buck-boost converter. When the
AC input is negative, Q2, Q3, Q4, Q5, Q6, Q8, Q9, and S are
turned off, Q7 is turned on, and Q1 is controlled by PWM
signal. The converter operates as an inverting buck-boost
converter.
When the AC voltage is positive, Q2, Q4, Q5, Q7, Q8, Q9,
and S are turned off, Q3 and Q6 are controlled by the same
PWM signal, and Q1 is controlled by a PWM signal which is
complementary to that of Q3 and Q6. The integrated converter
works as a non-inverting buck-boost converter. When the AC
voltage is negative, Q1, Q3, Q4, Q6, Q7, Q9, and S are turned
off, Q2 and Q5 are turned on, and Q8 is controlled by a PWM
signal. The converter operates as an inverting buck-boost
converter.
C. Mode III – Boost Operation from Add-on Battery to
High Voltage Bus of the PHEV
In this mode, the converter works as a boost converter. Fig.
5 shows the operation of the converter in this mode. Q1, Q2,
Q4, Q5, Q7, Q8, and Q9 are turned off, Q6 and S are turned
on, and Q3 is controlled by PWM signal.

B. Mode II – Vehicle-to-Grid (V2G)

In this mode, the converter operates as a non-inverting
buck-boost converter when the AC voltage is positive, and
operates as an inverting buck-boost converter when the AC
voltage is negative. Fig. 4 shows the operation of the
converter in this mode.

Fig. 5. Mode III – Boost operation from add-on battery to high voltage bus of
the PHEV.

D. Mode IV – Buck Operation for Regenerative

Charging of Add-on Battery
In this mode, the converter operates as a buck converter.
Fig. 6 shows the operation of the converter in this mode. Q1,
Q2, Q3, Q5, Q6, Q7, and Q8 are turned off, Q4 and S are PD = V F ⋅ I F (1)
turned on, and Q9 is controlled by PWM signal.
where VF is the forward voltage drop of the diode and IF is the
diode conduction current.
The conduction loss of IGBTs can be calculated based on
equation (2).
PQ = VCE ⋅ I CE (2)
where VCE is the voltage drop from collector to the emitter of
the IGBT in conduction and ICE is the IGBT conduction
current.
Fig. 6. Mode IV – Buck operation for regenerative charging of add-on battery. The efficiency of the converter (η ) can be calculated from
Pout
III. COMPARATIVE ANALYSIS η= (3)
Fig. 7 shows the topology of the conventional three stages Pin
converter for a PHEV in detail. Table II shows the component where Pin and Pout are the input and output powers of converter.
comparison of the three topologies. It is seen that the proposed The efficiency improvement is defined as (4).
topology has the least number of components. Thus, the size, Pout P 1
weight and cost are reduced in the proposed converter. Δη = η new − η old = − out = − η old
Pin − ΔP Pin 1 ΔP
Furthermore, since fewer semiconductor switches are −
involved, the conduction losses of the switches are reduced, η old Pout
and thus the conversion efficiency is improved. The four (4)
modes of operation of the conventional converter will be
where η new and η old are the conversion efficiencies of the
compared to the proposed converter in Section III to get an
estimation of changes in conduction losses and conversion proposed converter and conventional converter, respectively.
efficiency. ΔP is the conduction power loss due to the more switches in
The conduction loss of diodes can be calculated based on the conventional topology in compare to the proposed
the equation (1). structure.

Fig. 7. Conventional three stages charger topology for PHEV.

Table II. Component comparison.

Components Table IV. Changes of conduction losses and efficiency.
Topology
S D L Switch Total Efficiency
Mode Switch
Conventional 11 11 2 Loss Loss Improvement
Integrated Topology in Fig. 1(b) 10 9 1 D1 13W 0.764%
Proposed 9 3 1 Positive 26W ~
D2 13W 0.968% 0.764%
Table III. Operation conditions. I ~
Operation Mode Output Power D3 13W 0.764% 0.968%
Mode I 2.2 kW Negative 26W ~
Mode II 1.1 kW D4 13W 0.968%
Mode III 7 kW (max)
Mode IV 6 kW (max) Q1 6.4W 0.752%
η old = 80% ~ 90% Positive 12.8W ~
Q2 6.4W 0.952% 0.752%
AC Voltage V AC = 220V / 50 HZ
II ~
Battery Voltage V B = 201.6V Q3 6.4W 0.752% 0.952%
Negative 12.8W ~
High Voltage Bus V HV = 500V
Q4 6.4W 0.952%
Discrete IGBT: IRG4PC50S, 70A/600V, VCE = 1.28V
III — — 0 0 0 0
Co-pack IGBT: IRG4PC50SDPbF, 70A/600V, VCE = 1.28V , IV — — 0 0 0 0
VF = 1.3V
 The converter operation conditions and the parameters of IV. SIMULATION RESULTS
the selected semiconductor devices are listed in table III. The In this section, four operation modes of the proposed
conduction loss calculations are based on these parameters. converter are simulated and analysed. The simulation results
Since the voltage drop across the collector and emitter of the of these four modes are shown in Fig. 8 to Fig. 10. Fig. 8
selected IGBT in ON state, which is 1.28V, is very close to shows the simulation results of mode I. In this mode, the AC
the forward voltage drop of the body diode, which is 1.3V, it input voltage is 220V, 50HZ, and 10 A (RMS) current is
is assumed that the conduction losses for the IGBT and its drawn from the grid to charge the battery. The nominal
body diode are the same for simplicity of calculations. voltage of the battery is 201.6V, with the capacity of 5.2 kWh,
For mode I, with positive AC input voltage, which are the parameters of the add-on battery pack of Toyota
ΔP+ = PD1 + PD 2 = I AC ⋅ (V F . D1 + VF .D 2 ) Prius. The converter works at the frequency of 50kHz in this
= 10 × (1.3 + 1.3) = 26W mode. Fig. 9 shows the simulation results of mode II. In this
mode, the battery feeds 5A (RMS) current back to the grid.
1 The converter is controlled using a hysteresis control. Fig. 10
Δη + = − η old = 0.764% ~ 0.968%
1 ΔP shows the simulation results of operation modes III & IV. In
− this mode, the power demand of Urban Dynamometer Driving
η old Pout
Schedule (UDDS) is considered. In the simulation, the power
where I AC is the input current from the AC grid to the demand from 1232s to 1242s is adopted to test the
converter and it is 10A (RMS) in this case. functionality of the proposed converter. Positive power
With negative AC input voltage, demand means that the battery is required to provide power to
ΔP− = PD 3 + PD 4 = I AC ⋅ (VF .D 3 + V F . D 4 ) the high voltage bus for driving (mode III), while negative
values mean that the converter captures power from the high
= 10 × (1.3 + 1.3) = 26W voltage bus to charge the battery via regenerative braking
1 (mode IV). The converter is controlled to operate in this mode
Δη − = − η old = 0.764% ~ 0.968% at the frequency of 50kHz.
1 ΔP
−
η old Pout
Thus, the overall efficiency improvement in mode I is
Δη + + Δη −
Δη I = = 0.764% ~ 0.968%
2
For mode II, with positive AC voltage,
'
ΔP+ = PQ1 + PQ 2 = I AC ⋅ (VCE .Q1 + VCE .Q 2 )
= 5 × (1.28 + 1.28) = 12.8W
1
Δη + = − η old = 0.752% ~ 0.952%
1 ΔP
−
η old Pout
'
where I AC is the output current from the converter to the AC
grid and it is 5A (RMS) in this case. With negative AC
[A]

voltage,
'
ΔP− = PQ 3 + PQ 4 = I AC ⋅ (VCE .Q 3 + VCE .Q 4 )
= 5 × (1.28 + 1.28) = 12.8W
1
Δη − = − η old = 0.752% ~ 0.952%
1 ΔP
−
η old Pout
Thus, the overall efficiency improvement in mode II is
Δη + + Δη −
Δη II = = 0.752% ~ 0.952%
2
For mode III and IV, the same number of switches are
involved, thus
Δη III = Δη IV = 0
The overall changes of conduction losses and efficiency are Fig. 8. Simulation results of mode I.
listed in table IV.

Fig. 9. Simulation results of mode II.
Fig. 10. Simulation results of mode III & IV.
V. CONCLUSION
The direct AC/DC conversion theory and its application in
PHEVs are presented in this manuscript. A novel single stage
integrated bidirectional AC/DC and DC/DC converter for
PHEVs is introduced. In compare to previous works which
uses three stage or two stage cascaded converters, the
proposed converter integrates the PHEV converter topology
into single stage, by eliminating the full bridge rectifier. The
two stage integrated converter reduces the number of
inductors, with the cost of more switches and slightly lower
efficiency. The proposed converter not only utilizes the least
number of components; but also demonstrates higher
conversion efficiency. The simulation results show that the
converter has the capability of operating in four modes, i.e.
plug-in charging of add-on battery, Vehicle-to-Grid (V2G),
boost operation from add-on battery to high voltage dc-bus of
the PHEV, and buck operation for regenerative charging of
the add-on battery.
VI. ACKNOWLEDGMENT
This work has been partly supported by the U.S. National
Science Foundation under Grant number 0801860, which is
greatly acknowledged.
REFERENCES
[1] William B. Ribbens, Understanding Automotive Electronics, 6th ed.
Newnes, NY: New York, 2003.
[2] C. –S. Wang, O. H. Stielau, and G. A. Govic, “Design considerations
for a contactless electric vehicle battery charger,” IEEE Trans. Ind.
Electron., vol. 52, no. 5, pp. 1308-1314, Oct. 2005.
[3] M. G. Egan, D. L. O’Sullivan, J. G. Hayes, M. J. Willers, and C. P.
Henze, “Power-factor-corrected single-stage inductive charger for
electric vehicle batteries,” IEEE Trans. Ind. Electron., vol54, no. 2, pp.
1217-1226, Apr. 2007.
[4] S. –K. Sul and S. –J. Lee, “An integral battery charger for four-wheel
drive electric vehicle,” IEEE Trans. Ind. Appl., vol. 31, no. 5, pp. 1096-
1099, Oct. 1995.
[5] L. Solero, “Nonconventional on-board charger for electric vehicle
propulsion batteries,” IEEE Trans. Veh. Technol., vol. 50, no. 1, pp.
144-149, Jan. 2001.
[6] C. Aguilar, F. Canales, J. Arau, J. Sebastian, and J. Uceda, “An
integrated battery charger/discharger with power-factor correction,”
IEEE Trans. Ind. Electron., vol. 44, no. 5, pp. 597-603, Oct. 1997.
[7] N. Mohan, T. M. Undeland, and W. P. Robbins, Power Electronics:
Converters, Applications, and Design, 3rd ed. Hoboken, Nj: Wiley,
2003.
[8] Y. Lee, A. Khaligh, and A. Emadi, “Advanced integrated bi-directional
AC/DC and DC/DC converter for plug-in hybrid electric vehicles,”
IEEE Trans. Veh. Technol., vol. 58, no. 3, pp. 3970-3980, Oct. 2009.
[9] R. Saurada and A. Khaligh, “A novel approach towards integration of
propulsion machine inverter with energy storage charger in plug-in
hybrid electric vehicles,” in Proc. IEEE 36th Annual Conference on
Industrial Electronics Society., Phoenix, AZ, Nov. 2010, pp. 2493-
2498.