Comparative performance evaluation of series connected 15 kV SiC IGBT devices and 15 kV SiC MOSFET devices for MV power conversion systems

Abstract

The 10–15kV SiC MOSFET and 15kV SiC IGBT (2 μm and 5 μm buffer layer) are the state of the art high voltage devices designed by Cree Inc. These devices are expected to increase the power density of converters and the demonstration of these devices in applications like Solid State Transformers (SST) have been reported up to 4.16 kV–13.2 kV grid connection. It is interesting to investigate the performance of the devices in very high voltage (≥13.2 kV) application, where the series connection of devices is required. Therefore, this paper addresses design considerations of the series connection of 15 kV Silicon Carbide (SiC) IGBT devices and a series connection of 10 kV/15 kV Silicon Carbide (SiC) MOSFET devices in two separate independent cases and their experimental comparison.