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Silicon Carbide Power Transistors: A New Era in Power Electronics Is Initiated

Article in IEEE Industrial Electronics Magazine · June 2012

DOI: 10.1109/MIE.2012.2193291

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A New Era in Power Electronics Is Initiated

D
uring recent years, silicon carbide (SiC) power electronics has gone
JACEK RA˛BKOWSKI, from being a promising future technology to being a potent alternative
DIMOSTHENIS PEFTITSIS, to state-of-the-art silicon (Si) technology in high-efficiency, high-
and HANS-PETER NEE frequency, and high-temperature applications. The reasons for this are
that SiC power electronics may have higher voltage ratings, lower volt-
age drops, higher maximum temperatures, and higher thermal conduc-
tivities. It is now a fact that several manufacturers are capable of
developing and processing high-quality transistors at cost that permit introduction of
new products in application areas where the benefits of the SiC technology can provide
significant system advantages. The additional cost for the SiC transistors in comparison

Digital Object Identifier 10.1109/MIE.2012.2193291

Date of publication: 15 June 2012

1932-4529/12/$31.00&2012IEEE JUNE 2012 n IEEE INDUSTRIAL ELECTRONICS MAGAZINE 17

 the only available SiC switches
are the JFET [2], [3], BJT [4], and
MOSFET [5], [6]. Commercially avail-
able SiC devices are still not in mass
production. Thus, the market price of
these components is significantly
higher than their Si counterparts. On
the other hand, because of the low
voltage and current ratings of these
SiC devices, they are currently not
suitable for power ratings above
several hundred kilowatts. In particu-
lar, voltage ratings in the range of
1,200 V and current ratings of few tens
of amperes are available. Regardless
of the type of SiC device, the driver
for each device counts as a vital part
when the SiC devices operate in a
power electronics converter. The
driver requirements differ among the
FIGURE 1 – A 40-kVA SiC inverter (300 3 370 3 100 mm3) shown together with a copy of devices, and they should be designed
IEEE Industrial Electronics Magazine.
in such a way that they ensure reli-
able operation. Finally, it is also worth
with corresponding Si alternatives source converter (VSC)-based HVdc mentioning the progress of the re-
are significantly smaller today than is to build modular converters, the search on the SiC IGBT [2]. To start
the reduction in cost or increase in need for voltage ratings in excess of with, an overview of the currently
value seen from a systems perspec- 10 kV may be questionable, since available SiC devices is given followed
tive in many applications. In all these such a device in SiC would have a by the driver aspects for each device.
cases, the SiC transistors are unipo- voltage drop with a built-in potential
lar devices, such as the junction field- of more than 3 V. Since the fabrica- SiC JFET
effect transistor (JFET), the metal- tion of SiC IGBTs is far more complex The first attempts to design and fabri-
oxide-silicon field-effect transistor than, for instance, that of an SiC JFET cate an SiC JFET were made in the
(MOSFET), and the bipolar junction or a BJT, it makes sense first to fully early 1990s when the main research
transistor (BJT). The latter may seem exploit the benefits of these devices. issues were dealing with the design
to be a bipolar device, but from Today, it is possible to build switch- optimization to realize high-power
experiments, it is found that available mode inverters in the 10–100 kW and high-frequency SiC devices [7]. It
1,200-V SiC BJTs behave as unipolar range with efficiencies well above was during these years that a few
devices in the sense that there are 99.5%. A successful example is a 40- research groups had started men-
practically no dynamic effects associ- kVA three-phase SiC inverter with ten tioning the advantageous character-
ated with build up or removal of parallel-connected JFETs in each istics of the SiC material compared
excess charges. The reason for this is switch position. This inverter has an with Si [8], [9]. However, from the
that the doping levels of 1,200-V SiC efficiency of approximately 99.7% structure design point of view, the
transistors are so high that any con- (Figure 1). Truly, a new era in power early-year SiC JFET was suffering
siderable carrier injection is superflu- electronics has begun. from relatively low transconductance
ous for the conduction mechanism. values, low channel mobilities, and
For voltage ratings beyond 4.5 kV, Overview of the Available difficulties in the fabrication process
true bipolar devices will probably SiC Devices [8], [9]. During the last decade, the
be necessary. In high-voltage high- The dramatic quality improvement of improvement on the SiC material and
power applications such as high-volt- the SiC material [1] in combination the development of 3- and 4-in wavers
age direct current transmission with excellent research and develop- have both contributed to the fabrica-
(HVdc), insulated gate bipolar tran- ment efforts on the design and fabri- tion of the modern SiC JFETs [2], and
sistors (IGBTs), and BJTs in SiC may cation of SiC devices by several it was around 2005 when the first
seem as the ideal switch candidates research groups has recently re- prototype samples of SiC JFETs were
as very high numbers of series-con- sulted in a strong commercialization released to the market.
nected devices would be necessary of SiC switch-mode devices [1], [2]. One of the modern designs of the
to withstand system voltages. How- Nevertheless, the SiC device market SiC JFET is the so-called lateral chan-
ever, since the trend in voltage is still in an early stage, and today, nel JFET (LCJFET), as shown in

18 IEEE INDUSTRIAL ELECTRONICS MAGAZINE n JUNE 2012

Figure 2. The load current through
the device can flow in both directions Gate (p-Type)
depending on the circuit conditions, Source n+ Source n+
and it is controlled by a buried pþ p
gate and an nþ source p-n junction. n+ n+
P+ P+
This SiC JFET is a normally on device,
and a negative gate-source voltage
must be applied to turn the device Buried p-Well
off. By applying a negative gate-
source voltage, the channel width is
decreased because of the creation of n- Drift Region
a certain space-charge region, and a
reduction in current is obtained. n Field Stop
There is a specific value of the nega-
Substrate n++
tive gate-source voltage, which is
called ‘‘pinch-off voltage,’’ and under
this voltage, the device current Drain
equals zero. The typical range of the
pinch-off voltages of this device is FIGURE 2 – Cross section of the normally on SiC LCJFET.
between 16 and 26 V. An impor-
tant feature of this structure is the state. The pinch-off voltage for the as the body diode of the LCJFET.
antiparallel body diode, which is DMVJFET equals approximately 6 V, Except during these short-time
formed by the pþ source side, the n whereas the positive pinch-off volt- transients, the reverse current
drift region, and the nþþ drain. How- age for the normally off one is slightly should flow through the channel.
ever, the forward voltage drop of the higher than 1 V. Comparing this type The additional SiC Schottky diode
body diode is higher compared with of SiC JFETs to the LCJFET, the is especially attractive if several
the on-state voltage of the channel absence of the antiparallel body VTJFETs are connected in parallel,
[2], [10] at rated (or lower) current diode in the DMVTJFET makes the and the voltage across the transis-
densities. Thus, for providing the LCJFET design more attractive for tors is lower than the threshold
antiparallel diode function, the chan- numerous applications. However, a voltage of the diode. In this case,
nel should be used to minimize the SiC Schottky diode can be connected only one diode would be necessary
on-state losses. The body diode may as the antiparallel diode for the for all parallel JFETs because of the
be used for safety only for short-time VTJFET. This diode may be used for short (<500 ns) conduction interval
transitions [11]. This type of SiC JFET short-time transients in the same way of the diode.
has been released by SiCED (Infin-
eon) a few years ago, and it is going to
be commercial in the near future. Source Source
The second commercially avail-
able SiC JFET is the vertical trench
(VTJFET), which was released in 2008 n+ n+
by Semisouth Laboratories [12], [13].
A cross-section schematic of its
structure is shown in Figure 3. The Gate
VTJFET SiC JFET can be either a (p-Type)
normally off (enhancement-mode
VTJFET-EMVTJFET) or a normally on
(depletion-mode VTJFET-DMVTJFET)
device, depending on the thickness
of the vertical channel and the dop- n- Drift Region
ing levels of the structure. As other
normally on JFET designs, a negative
gate-source voltage is necessary to
keep it in the off state. On the n+ Substrate
other hand, a significant gate current
(approximately 200 mA for a 30-A Drain
device) is necessary for the normally
off JFET to keep it in the conduction FIGURE 3 – Cross section of the SiC VTJFET.

JUNE 2012 n IEEE INDUSTRIAL ELECTRONICS MAGAZINE 19

 Source Source T-Gate Source

n+
Gate Gate n+ n+
P+ Top

B-Gate
p+ Buried Gate
p+ Buried Gate Gate p+ Buried Gate

n-epi

n- Drift Region
n- Drift Region

n+ Substrate n+ Substrate

Drain Drain
(a) (b)

FIGURE 4 – (a) Cross section of BGJFET and (b) SiC DGTJFET.

Two additional SiC JFET designs The commercially available SiC an NPN BJT. The low on-state voltage
have been presented [Figure 4(a) JFETs are mainly rated at 1,200 V, drop is obtained because of the
and (b)] [14]. The buried grid JFET while 1,700 V devices are also avail- cancellation of the base-emitter and
(BGJFET), shown in Figure 4(a), able on the market. The current rating base-collector junction voltages. The
makes use of a small cell pitch, which of normally on JFETs is up to 48 A, and SiC BJT is a current-driven device,
contributes to the low specific on- devices having on-state resistances of which means that a substantial
state resistance and high saturation 100, 85, and 45 mX at room tempera- continuous base current is required
current densities. The absence of the ture can be found. As for the normally as long as it conducts a collector cur-
antiparallel body diode and the diffi- on JFETs, the normally off counter- rent. The available SiC BJTs have a
culties in the fabrication process parts (EMVTJFETs) are available at voltage rating of 1.2 kV and current
compared with the LCJFET count as current ratings up to 30 A and have ratings in the range of 6–40 A, while
two basic drawbacks of this design. on-state resistances of 100 and 63 mX. current gains of more than 70 have
Figure 4(b) shows the double been reported at room temperature
gate vertical channel trench JFET SiC BJT for a 6-A device [15]. The fabrication
(DGVTJFET), which is actually a com- The SiC BJT is a bipolar normally of the SiC BJTs with improved sur-
bination of the LCJFET and the off device, which combines both a face passivation leads to current rat-
BGJFET designs, and it has been pro- low on-state voltage drop (0.32 V at ings of 50 A at 100 °C and current
posed by DENSO [14]. This design 100 A/cm2) [4] and a quite fast- gains higher than 100. However, the
combines fast switching capability switching performance. It has been current gain is strongly temperature
due to the low gate-drain capacitance deeply investigated, designed, and dependent, and in particular, it drops
with low specific on-state resistance fabricated by TranSiC. A cross sec- by more than 50% at 250 °C compared
because of the small cell pitch and tion of this device is shown in Fig- with room temperature. The develop-
double gate control. ure 5, where it is obvious that this is ment of SiC BJTs has been successful,
and in spite of the need for the base
current, SiC BJTs having competitive
Surface Passivation performance in the kilovolt range are
Emitter Contact expected in the future.
Base
Contact
N Emitter SiC MOSFET
Several years have been spent on the
P Base
research and development of the SiC
MOSFET. Specifically, the fabrication
N Collector Base Implant
and stability of the oxide layer has
JTE Implant been challenging. A cross section of
N+ Substrate a typical SiC MOSFET structure is
shown in Figure 6. The normally off
Collector Contact behavior of the SiC MOSFET makes it
attractive to the designers of power
FIGURE 5 – Cross section of the SiC BJT. electronic converters. Unfortunately,

20 IEEE INDUSTRIAL ELECTRONICS MAGAZINE n JUNE 2012

the low channel mobilities cause
additional on-state resistance of the Gate
Source Source
device and thus increased on-state
power losses. Additionally, the reli- N+ N+
ability and the stability of the gate
p Well p Well
oxide layer, especially over long time
periods and at elevated tempera- Gate Oxide Layer
tures, have not been confirmed yet.
Fabrication issues also contribute to
the deceleration of SiC MOSFET n-Drift
development. However, the currently
presented results regarding the SiC n+ Substrate
MOSFETs are quite promising, and it
is believed that such devices will be Drain
available for mass production within
a few years. The SiC MOSFET is the FIGURE 6 – Cross section of the SiC MOSFET.
most recent SiC switch, which was
released during the end of 2010 from in the future, it is not obvious that they are essentially the same as
Cree, while other manufacturers they will give low-power losses as a those for Si MOSFETs, except that a
(e.g., ST Microelectronics) are very high-voltage SiC JFET (e.g., 3.3-kV SiC higher gate voltage (more than 20 V)
close to releasing their own MOSFET JFET) if modularized circuits such as is required in the on state.
in SiC [1], [5]. At present, 1.2-kV SiC modular multilevel converter (M2C)
MOSFETs with current ratings of are used for high-voltage high-power Normally On SiC JFET Gate Driver
10–20 A and on-state resistances of applications [38]. The normally on SiC JFET is a voltage-
80 and 160 mX are available on the controlled device. Thus, a negative
market. Furthermore, SiC MOSFET Gate and Base Drivers gate-source voltage, which should be
chips rated at 10 A and 10 kV have for SiC Devices lower than the pinch-off voltage, is
also been investigated by Cree as a To use the advantageous perform- required to keep this device in the off
part of a 120-A half-bridge module ance of SiC devices compared with state. The most widely used gate
[43]. When compared with the state- the Si counterparts, special driver driver for the SiC JFET was proposed
of-the-art 6.5-kV Si IGBT, the 10-kV SiC designs are required. Such gate and a few years ago [17] (Figure 7). The
MOSFETs have a better performance. base drivers should be able to pro- main part of the driver is a parallel-
However, the commercialization of vide rapid switching for the SiC devi- connected network consisting of a
such a unipolar SiC device is not fore- ces but should also have the lowest diode D, a capacitor C, and high-value
seen in the near future. possible power consumption. Addi- resistor Rp , while a gate resistor Rg is
tionally, high-temperature operation connected in series with the gate.
SiC IGBT is also preferable for these drivers During the on state of the SiC JFET,
The Si-based IGBT has shown an because of the high-temperature ca- the output of the buffer, Vg , equals
excellent performance for a wide pability of the SiC devices. Various 0 V, and the device is conducting the
range of voltage and current ratings drivers for SiC JFETs and SiC BJTs current. When the JFET is turned off,
during the last two decades. The fabri- have been proposed since these devi- the buffer voltage, Vg , is switched
cation of a Si n-type IGBT started on a ces started to be available on the mar- from 0 V to Vs . At this time, a cur-
p-type substrate. Such substrates are ket. Drivers for SiC MOSFETs have rent peak is supplied to the gate-
also available in SiC, but their resistiv- been omitted in this presentation as source junction of the JFET through
ity is unacceptably high and prevents
these components from being used in
power electronics applications. Fur-
thermore, the performance of the gate 0
Rp Cdg
oxide layer is also poor, resulting in
Vg Rg
high channel resistivities. These
D
issues have already been investigated Normally On
by many highly qualified scientists, C Cgs SiC JFET
and it is believed that such SiC devi-
ces will not be commercialized within –Vs
the next ten years [2], [16]. On the 0
contrary, even if high-voltage SiC
IGBTs will be commercially available FIGURE 7 – Gate driver of the normally on SiC JFET.

JUNE 2012 n IEEE INDUSTRIAL ELECTRONICS MAGAZINE 21

 provided to the gate so that the
recharge of the gate-source capaci-
tance of the device is faster. A two-
stage gate driver with resistors has
been proposed for a 1,200-V/30-A
normally off JFET (Figure 9). This
driver consists of two stages: the
dynamic one with a standard driver
and a resistor RB2 , which provides
high voltage, and thus high-current
peaks, during a short time period to
turn the JFET on and off rapidly. The
second stage is the static one with a
dc/dc step-down converter, a BJT,
and a resistor RB1 . The auxiliary BJT
2 3 1 is turned on when the dynamic stage
100 V BW 5.00 A BW 20.0 ns 2.50GS/s –3.20 V is completed. The static stage is able
FIGURE 8 – Turn-off process of the normally on SiC JFET (VDS : drain–source voltage—100 V/div to supply a gate current of approxi-
and ID : drain current—5 A/div, time base 20 ns/div). mately 200 mA during the on state of
the JFET. An important advantage of
the gate resistor Rg , and the capaci- Rg . The switching performance of this this driver is the absence of the
tor C, as shown with the dashed line gate driver, when it is used with a SiC speed-up capacitor, which might cause
in Figure 7. Hence, the parasitic LCJFET, is shown in Figure 8. duty-ratio limitations because of the
capacitance of the gate-source junc- Despite the overwhelming advan- associated charging and discharging
tion, Cgs , is charged, and the voltage tages of the normally on SiC JFET, the times. Finally, another gate driver for
drop across the capacitor C equals main problem with this device is that normally off SiC JFETs has been
the voltage difference between Vs a possibly destructive shoot through is presented in [19] to use the fast
and the breakdown voltage of the obtained in case the power supply for switching performance of this device.
gate. During the steady-state opera- the gate driver is lost. It is, therefore,
tion in the off-state, a low current is more than essential to design smart gate SiC BJT Base Driver
only required to keep the JFET off. drivers to overcome such problems. As already mentioned, the SiC BJT is
This current is supplied through the a current-driven device, which
resistor Rp , as shown with the solid Normally Off SiC JFET requires a substantial base current
line in Figure 7. It is worth mentioning Gate Driver during the on state. The simplest
that the value of Rp should be chosen Even though the normally off SiC base-drive unit for SiC BJTs consists
carefully to avoid breakdown of the EMVTJFET seems to be a voltage- of a series-connected resistor with
gate-source junction. Regardless of controlled device, a substantial gate the base, which is supplied by a volt-
the choice of Rp , it is possible to current is required during the con- age source. However, the switching
adjust the switching performance to duction state to obtain a reasonable performance of such a driver is poor
any desired speed by selecting an on-state resistance [18]. In addition when it is optimized for low power
adequate value of the gate resistor to this, high-current peaks should be consumption. Considering this base
driver, the switching performance
can be improved by connecting a
VCC
speed-up capacitor, CB , in parallel to
VCC the resistor [4] (Figure 10). Hence,
dc the switching performance might be
improved, but this improvement
dc RDRV
depends on the supply voltage, Vcc .
RB C
RB1 B The higher the supply voltage, the
RDRV
RB2 faster the switching transients, but at
E the same time, the power consump-
Normally Off CB tion is increased. Therefore, it seems
SiC JFET
that the switching performance and
VEE the power consumption in this case
is a tradeoff.
FIGURE 9 – Two-stage gate-drive unit for FIGURE 10 – Base-drive unit with speed-up To combine fast switching per-
normally off SiC JFETs. capacitor for a SiC BJT. formance and low power consumption,

22 IEEE INDUSTRIAL ELECTRONICS MAGAZINE n JUNE 2012

a base driver consisting of two voltage
sources can be employed [20]. A turn- 1 2 100V/ 3 4 2.00A / 21.00sn 20.00sn / Stop 1 3.94 V
on process using this driver is shown
in Figure 11. The high-voltage supply
contributes to the high switching Vce
speed, while the power consumption
of the driver is optimized by using the
low-voltage supply connected to a Ic
carefully chosen base resistor. When
the turn-on process starts, high-cur-
rent peaks are provided to the base
so that the SiC BJT is turned on
rapidly. During the conduction state,
the base current is determined by the 2
current gain. Since this continuous 4
base current is supplied from a low-
voltage source, the losses during the
on-state can be kept fairly low. FIGURE 11 – Turn-on process of the 6-A SiC BJT with dual-source base driver (Vce : collec-
tor–emitter voltage—100 V/div and Ic : collector current—2 A/div, time base 20 ns/div).

Parallel Connection of
SiC Devices SiC JFETs are the pinch-off voltage of new drivers is essential to handle
In several power electronics applica- and the reverse breakdown voltage parallel connection reliably.
tions, higher current ratings are of the gate. It was found that dif- A successful example of the paral-
required than those of the available ferences of approximately 25% in lel connection of ten JFETs in each
SiC transistors. It is, therefore, neces- switching losses could result from a switch position is the 40-kVA inverter
sary to build either multichip modules difference in the pinch-off voltage of [23] shown in Figure 1. Despite the
or to parallel-connect several single- 0.5 V. Additionally, the transient cur- high number of parallel-connected
chip components. In both cases, it is rent may not be equally shared devices, the total semiconductor
essential to keep track of both steady- because of differences in the static cost is approximately US$37.5/kW of
state and transient current sharing of transfer characteristics. rated power, which is higher com-
parallel-connected chips. Unless the One solution to the parallel con- pared with the corresponding cost
transient current is not equally shared nection of SiC devices could be when Si IGBTs are employed. How-
among the devices, the switching sorting with respect to the most ever, the outstanding switching per-
losses caused in the device that con- critical parameters, which affect their formance of SiC JFETs (Figure 12) and
ducts the highest current will be switching performance. However, as the outstandingly high efficiency (more
higher, resulting in an increased it was shown in [22], this is not than 99.5%) constitute the two driving
temperature. Similarly, a nonuniform always sufficient. Thus, development factors to invest in such a converter.
steady-state current sharing due to
the spread of the on-state voltage
drops or resistances will also result
1 2 20.0A / 3 20.0A / 4 2.00 V/ 33.17 sn 20.00sn / Stop 1 –6.50 V
in unequal temperature distribution.
The problems that are faced when
normally off SiC JFETs are connected Vds
in parallel have been shown in [21]. A
similar investigation regarding SiC
BJTs has also been presented by the
Idiode
same authors. In particular, it has been
shown that the transient currents of
these devices might suffer from mis-
matches, especially at high switching
speeds. But, on the contrary, during IJFET
3
steady-state operation, they have
shown excellent current sharing. 2
An investigation of parallel-con-
nected normally on SiC JFETs has been
FIGURE 12 – Turn-off process of 10 parallel SiC JFETs (Vds : drain–source voltage—200 V/
presented in [22]. The two most critical div and IJFET : drain current—20 A/div of one single JFET) with antiparallel SiC Schottky
parameters when parallel-connecting diode (Idiode : diode current—20 A/div, time base 20 ns/div).

JUNE 2012 n IEEE INDUSTRIAL ELECTRONICS MAGAZINE 23

 the technology of high-temperature
Efficiency power modules packaging have been
presented [27]. The SiC devices were
operating at 250 °C while the case
temperature was below 200 °C, but
reliability and long-term stability also
need to be investigated. The develop-
ment of high-temperature gate driv-
ers has been accelerated by the
introduction of the silicon-on-insula-
tor technology [28], [29] but the
development of SiC control electron-
cy
Frequency
ics is also promising [30].

Overview of Applications
Temperature
It cannot be denied that SiC power
device technology is currently in
FIGURE 13 – Three main directions in the design of power electronics converters with SiC devices. bloom, not to say in an explosion
stage as new things such as new devi-
Possibilities frequency is not crucial, one of the ces, driver concepts, or application
Based on the brief analysis of the other two possible design directions examples appear continuously.
available SiC power devices pre- might be chosen. Since the reduction Undoubtedly, only a fraction of all
sented earlier, it is clearly shown that of the power losses is equivalent to new developments is published. Prob-
their features are moving power an efficiency increase, a direct benefit ably some of the most interesting ex-
electronics into new areas. When it is the reduction of size and weight of amples are not revealed. This means
comes to the design stage of power the cooling equipment [23]. Further- that it is hard to give a true overview
electronic converters with SiC devi- more, water cooling or air-forced of the current SiC technology, but it is
ces instead of classic Si counterparts, cooling systems could be unneces- still possible to give an overview of
three different design directions may sary as the amount of dissipated heat what has been presented previously.
be chosen (Figure 13). is a few times lower. High efficiency is In contrast to the well-established
Since switching times in the range also important in power delivery and and mass-produced SiC Schottky
of nanoseconds have been reported, distribution systems as well as pho- diodes, the real application of SiC
the most obvious direction is the tovoltaic applications because the transistors in the field is still in the
increase of the switching frequency lower power loss is directly recalcu- early stage. However, using the data
up to a few hundred kilohertz. In the lated into profit. for the four available transistor
case of the available Si devices for The third design direction is high- types, it is possible to make reasona-
voltage ratings above 600 V, such temperature applications, as SiC de- ble forecasts about the performance
high switching frequencies can be vices are capable of being operated of future SiC converters. That is why
only reached when soft switching is at junction temperatures above a number of laboratory prototypes
employed [24]. From a system 450 °C. This is a totally new area of and demonstrators have been built
perspective, the design advantages power electronics aiming for automo- and experimentally tested by several
are reduction of size and weight of tive, space, or drill-hole applications. research groups around the world.
passive elements (e.g., inductors, However, the main deceleration fac-
capacitors) [25]. This results in bet- tor at elevated temperatures is not Photovoltaics
ter compactness of the converter, the device itself, but rather a lack of The advantageous features of the SiC
especially in dc/dc converters and suitable packaging technology, high- transistor perfectly match to meet
inverters with passive filters. Last temperature passive components, the two basic requirements of the
but not least, as the switching speeds and control electronics. Before real photovoltaic industry: increase in
are higher and the harmonics are high-temperature converters will be efficiency and integration of the
shifted up to higher frequencies, the released, small steps could be done inverter with the photovoltaic panel
size of electromagnetic interference with the existing SiC transistors. For [31]. In the power range of a single
(EMI) filters also will be reduced [26]. instance, with junction temperatures kilowatt, efficiencies more than 99%
Both short switching times and in the range of 200–250 °C, the thermal can be reached by replacing Si with
low voltage drops across SiC devices resistance of the heat sink could be SiC components, and even if the
result in significant reductions in higher, which leads to a reduction in device cost is higher, the overall sys-
power losses. Therefore, in applica- volume and weight. During recent tem benefits are significant. The SiC
tions where the increase of switching years, promising results regarding transistors can also be used in future

24 IEEE INDUSTRIAL ELECTRONICS MAGAZINE n JUNE 2012

integration of small inverters on the the best choice in the voltage range been done with a 12-kV/10-A SiC IGBT
backside of photovoltaic panels. Here, up to 4.5 kV, while for higher vol- in the laboratory [43].
harsh environmental conditions are tages, bipolar devices (BJT, IGBTs)
faced, and it is not possible to meet may be superior. However, the avail- Conclusions
high reliability and lifetime require- ability of SiC devices with high volt- A new era in power electronics is
ments with Si technology. However, age ratings is currently limited, even entered as new SiC transistors are
again the main argument against SiC if a few interesting examples could be introduced in high-efficiency, high-
devices is the cost, but the overall sys- found in the literature. The case of a frequency, and high-temperature ap-
tem benefits as well as the expected 300-MVA modular multilevel con- plications. Efficiencies well above
reduction of the device prices should verter for 300 kV HVdc transmission 99.5% are possible in the 10–100 kW
solve this problem in the future. is discussed in [38]. As the switching power range. High-quality samples of
frequency is only 150 Hz, the switch- 1,200 V JFETs, BJTs, and MOSFETs
AC Drives ing losses are very low. Together are available, and within a few years,
As the state-of-the-art Si devices with the low on-state resistance of mass-produced products using these
almost fulfill the requirements for the SiC JFETs, it is possible to achieve new devices will be on the market in
inverter-fed ac drives [32] and the an efficiency increase by 0.3% several application areas. The bene-
cost of SiC device cost will always be (900 kW) with respect to the Si IGBTs fits of the new devices are so over-
higher, there are very small chances case [39]. The benefit is not only the whelming that it cannot be afforded
for mass introduction of SiC electron- lower amount of heat that needs to from systems perspective to neglect
ics in this area. Nevertheless, it is be dissipated but also the lower the use of these devices.
very likely that features of the SiC energy cost. The possible application
devices could be utilized in many of 20-kV SiC gate turn-off thyristors
niches, especially when high efficien- (GTOs) in a 120-kV/1-kA HVdc inter- Biographies
cies and high power densities are face has been discussed in [40]. Jacek Ra˛bkowski received his
required [24]–[26] or when a high These devices are compared with the [Link]. and Ph.D. degrees in electrical
switching frequency is necessary to 4 3 5 kV Si counterparts by using an engineering from the Warsaw
feed a high-speed motor. analytical device model and by per- University of Technology, Poland, in
forming system simulations. Employ- 2000 and 2005, respectively. He
Hybrid Electric Vehicles ing the 20-kV SiC GTOs, a significant joined Institute of Control and
The gains when employing SiC tran- efficiency increase is expected at Industrial Electronics of this univer-
sistors in inverters for hybrid electric higher junction temperatures. sity as an assistant professor in
vehicles are extremely high [33]– Another interesting example of the 2005. Since 2010, he has been at the
[36]. The current trend deals with the high voltage capability of SiC JFETs is Laboratory of Electrical Energy Con-
integration of power electronic con- shown in [24], where six 1.2-kV tran- version, KTH Royal Institute of
verters with the combustion engine sistors connected in a supercascode Technology, Sweden, as a guest
using the same coolant at a tempera- configuration were tested up to 5 kV researcher. His research interests
ture above 100 °C. It is not likely that in a dc/dc converter. With 6.5-kV include novel topologies of power
the associated requirements can be JFETs, this converter would be able converters, PWM techniques, drive
fulfilled by Si electronics. Thus, SiC to operate at a voltage level above 20 units, and converters with SiC devi-
electronics with much higher temper- kV in a distribution system. More- ces. He has been taking part in a
ature limits is the best choice, and at over, the 10-kV SiC MOSFET is often few projects regarding application
the same time, very high efficiencies considered for high-voltage applica- of SiC JFETs and BJTs. He is a Mem-
are possible. However, the lack of reli- tions such as solid-state transform- ber of the IEEE.
able high-temperature packaging still ers [41]. In this case, although the Dimosthenis Peftitsis received
counts as a serious problem. Finally, power losses are a few times lower his diploma degree in electrical and
the auxiliary components, such as than the 6.5-kV IGBTs, the switching computer engineering from the
gate drivers and capacitors, have to frequency of such a converter is Democritus University of Thrace,
withstand high temperature opera- increased from 1 to 20 kHz to reduce Greece, in 2008. In the same year, he
tions, which is a great challenge. the size of high-voltage transformers. spent a semester at ABB Corporate
The 15-kV n-channel SiC IGBT has Research in Västerås, Sweden, work-
High-Power Applications been considered in a study regarding ing on his diploma thesis. Since
The high blocking voltage capability smart grid applications [42]. Despite 2008, he has been working toward
of the SiC devices makes them attrac- the promising simulation results of his Ph.D. degree in the Laboratory
tive in the area of high-power con- the n-channel SiC IGBT (low on-state of Electrical Energy Conversion,
verters for grid applications [37] voltage and switching energies lower KTH Royal Institute of Technology,
such as HVdc. According to [14], uni- than the 6.5 kV Si counterpart), Stockholm, Sweden. His research
polar devices such as JFETs will be experimental verification has only interests include gate and base

JUNE 2012 n IEEE INDUSTRIAL ELECTRONICS MAGAZINE 25

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26 IEEE INDUSTRIAL ELECTRONICS MAGAZINE n JUNE 2012

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