Design and Analysis of a New Coupled Inductor-Based Interleaved High Step-Up DC-DC Converter for Renewable Energy Applications

Abstract

In this paper, a novel nonisolated interleaved high step-up DC-DC converter is proposed based on the coupled inductor and voltage multiplier cell (VMC) methods. Due to the interleaved structure, its input current ripple is low. The low input current ripple and also high power efficiency make the proposed converter suitable for renewable energy applications like photovoltaic (PV) and fuel cell (FC) power generation systems. The windings of the coupled inductors are combined with VMCs to further increase the output voltage with a low power switch’s duty cycle. This combination also leads to obtaining a flexible voltage gain that can be adjusted by coupled inductors’ turns ratio and power switches’ duty cycle. The voltage peaks over semiconductors are much lower than the output voltage. Therefore, low-rated semiconductors can be used for the implementation of the proposed converter, which can reduce the cost and volume. Generally, high voltage gain, low voltage, current stress of power switches, low input current ripple, high efficiency, common ground between the input and output ports, and a low number of elements are the main benefits of the suggested structure. The operation principle, steady-state analysis, and comparison with other converters are presented to show the advantages of the suggested converter. Also, a prototype is built, and the experimental results are presented to prove the theoretical analysis. This prototype is implemented with 200 W rated power, 25 V∼400 V voltage conversion, and 50 kHz switching frequency. Additionally, the efficiency is measured at 95.3% at the rated power.