Loss balancing of three-level inverters in electric vehicles for low speed operation

The most stressful operation point for the inverter of an electric vehicle drive is at low speed. In this operation point, one power semiconductor is mainly stressed because of a high loss concentration. The possibilities of distributing the losses among the power semiconductors through a new modulation is studied for the three-level NPC and the T-Type inverter. The effect of the proposed modulation on the sizing of the power semiconductors is shown by application of the power semiconductor rating. For both inverter topologies, the presented modulation strategy is verified experimentally.

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