Reconfigurable dual active bridge converter for aircraft applications

The increase of electrical energy consumption in modern aircrafts stimulates manufactures to install a 540V DC bus in future aircrafts, together with the existing 270V and 28V DC buses. Energy transferred between the high voltage DC bus (HVDC, 270V) and the low voltage DC bus (LVDC, 28V) is made by bidirectional isolated DC-DC converters. A performing topology for these types of converters is the Dual Active Bridge (DAB) given its soft switching properties and the low number of components, which allow the converter to be highly compact. This paper introduces a new topology of DAB (named DABRSP) which uses only 4 switches at the high voltage (HV) side and can be used in 270V and 540V DC buses without oversizing switches. Oversizing is observed if regular Full Bridge (FB) or Neutral Point Clamped (NPC) converters are used in the HV side of the DAB. The proposed topology allows Zero Voltage Switching (ZVS) and Zero Current Switching (ZCS) the same way as in a typical DAB converter and it makes uses of a particular transformer to “magnetically” sum up 2-level voltages.

[1]  J.W. Kolar,et al.  Accurate small-signal model for an automotive bidirectional Dual Active Bridge converter , 2008, 2008 11th Workshop on Control and Modeling for Power Electronics.

[2]  J. W. Kolar,et al.  1 Megawatt, 20 kHz, isolated, bidirectional 12kV to 1.2kV DC-DC converter for renewable energy applications , 2010, The 2010 International Power Electronics Conference - ECCE ASIA -.

[3]  Florian Krismer,et al.  Modeling and optimization of bidirectional dual active bridge DC-DC converter topologies , 2010 .

[4]  S. Bhattacharya,et al.  A three-phase three winding topology for Dual Active Bridge and its D-Q mode control , 2012, 2012 Twenty-Seventh Annual IEEE Applied Power Electronics Conference and Exposition (APEC).

[5]  Xavier Roboam.  New trends and challenges of electrical networks embedded in “more electrical aircraft” , 2011, 2011 IEEE International Symposium on Industrial Electronics.

[6]  Johann W. Kolar,et al.  Intelligent Solid State Transformers (SSTs): A Key Building Block of Future Smart Grid Systems , 2011 .

[7]  J.A. Ortega,et al.  Moving towards a more electric aircraft , 2007, IEEE Aerospace and Electronic Systems Magazine.

[8]  J. W. Kolar,et al.  Design of a minimum weight dual active bridge converter for an Airborne Wind Turbine system , 2012, 2012 Twenty-Seventh Annual IEEE Applied Power Electronics Conference and Exposition (APEC).

[9]  J. W. Kolar,et al.  Strategies to reduce copper losses in connections of medium-frequency high-current converters , 2011, IECON 2011 - 37th Annual Conference of the IEEE Industrial Electronics Society.

[10]  J.W. Kolar,et al.  A comparative evaluation of isolated bi-directional DC/DC converters with wide input and output voltage range , 2005, Fourtieth IAS Annual Meeting. Conference Record of the 2005 Industry Applications Conference, 2005..