Abstract
Ensuring a protection scheme in a DC distribution system is more difficult to achieve against pole-to-ground faults than in AC distribution system because of the absence of zero crossing points and low line impedance. To complement the major obstacle of limiting the fault current, several compositions have been proposed related to mechanical switching and solid-state switching. Among them, solid-state circuit breakers (SSCBs) are considered to be a possible solution to limit fast fault current. However, they may cause problems in circuit complexity, reliability, and cost-related troubles because of the use of multiple power semiconductor devices and additional circuit configuration to commutate the current. This paper proposes a SSCB with a coupled inductor (SSCB-CI) that has a symmetrical configuration. The circuit is comprised of passive components like commutation capacitors, a CI, and damping resistors. Thus, the proposed SSCB-CI offers the advantages of a simple circuit configuration and fewer utilized power semiconductor devices than the other typical SSCBs in the DC microgrid. For the analysis, six operation states are described for the voltage across the main switches and fault current. The effectiveness of the SSCB-CI against the short-circuit fault is proved via simulation and experimental results in a lab-scale prototype.
Highlights
To verify the effectiveness under a pole-to-ground short-circuit fault, the solid-state circuit breakers (SSCBs)-coupled inductor (CI) is simulated in PSIM
This paper explores the circuit configuration of a solid-state DC circuit breaker with
Several passive components are considered for reducing the number of power semiconductor devices as a substitute for a complex circuit configuration in the early versions of the proposed SSCB
Summary
Publisher’s Note: MDPI stays neutral with regard to jurisdictional claims in published maps and institutional affiliations. SSCBs have been proposed in many studies to verify the validity of fault isolation effectively, and they have mainly dealt with the requirements of a fast fault clearing time or noticeable circuit configuration using several kinds of power semiconductor devices. In order to achieve affordable circuit configuration and beneficial effects, the principally considered methods are circuit configuration based on power semiconductor devices or artificially commutating the fault current [11,12]. CI is a solution for the optimization of two or more inductors by one magnetic component [16,17] It has the advantage of a simple configuration with a bi-directional energy flow and fault interruption [18,19,20]. To come up with an effective method considering the drawbacks due to the complex circuit configuration and cost-related problems, several passive components, capacitors, resistors, and two-winding coupled-inductors are employed without semiconductor devices.
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