Abstract-Planar magnetic components using printed-circuitboard windings are attractive due to their high repeatability, good thermal performance and usefulness for realizing intricate winding patterns. To enable higher system integration at high switching frequency, more sophisticated methods that can rapidly and accurately model planar magnetics are needed. This paper develops a lumped circuit model that captures the impact of skin and proximity effects on current distribution and electromagnetic fields in planar magnetics. This enables accurate predictions of impedances, losses, stored reactive energy and current sharing among parallel windings. This lumped model is also a circuit domain representation of electromagnetic interactions. It can be used to simulate circuits incorporating planar magnetics, to visualize the electromagnetic fields, and to extract parameters for magnetic models by simulations. The modeling results match with previous theories and finite-element-modeling results. A group of planar magnetic devices, including transformers and inductors with various winding patterns, are prototyped and measured to validate the proposed approach.

Electrolytic capacitors are often used for energy buffering applications, including buffering between single-phase ac and dc. While these capacitors have high energy density compared to film and ceramic capacitors, their life is limited and their reliability is a major concern. This thesis presents a series of stacked switched capacitor (SSC) energy buffer architectures which overcome this limitation while achieving comparable effective energy density without electrolytic capacitors. The architectural approach is introduced along with design and control techniques which enable this energy buffer to interface with other circuits. A prototype SSC energy buffer using film capacitors, designed for a 320 V dc bus and able to support a 135 W load has been built and tested with a power factor correction circuit.This thesis starts with a detailed comparative study of electrolytic, film, and ceramic capacitors, then introduces the principles of SSC energy buffer architectures, and finally designs and explains the design methodologies of a prototype circuit. The experimental results successfully demonstrate the effectiveness of the approach.

Abstract-The penetration of plug-in electric vehicles and renewable distributed generation is expected to increase over the next few decades. Large scale unregulated deployment of either technology can have a detrimental impact on the electric grid. However, appropriate pairing of these technologies along with some storage could mitigate their individual negative impacts. This paper presents a framework and an optimization methodology for designing grid-connected systems that integrate plug-in electric vehicle chargers, distributed generation and storage. To demonstrate its usefulness, this methodology is applied to the design of optimal architectures for a residential charging case. It is shown that, given current costs, maximizing grid power usage minimizes system lifecycle cost. . Some PHEVs and EVs have been released into the market, and although estimates vary, by 2020 roughly 2 million PEVs are expected to be on the road in the US, increasing to 14 million (about 5% of the light duty vehicle fleet) by 2030 [3], [4]. However, penetration across the country is not expected to be uniform. Some west coast utilities expect PEV penetration of around 5% in their service territories by as early as 2020 [5]. Such levels of penetration will require large scale deployment of residential and public chargers [6], [7]. In parallel to these developments, there is strong legislative effort to mandate, or incentivize, large scale integration of renewable energy resources, including renewable distributed generation (DG), into the electric grid. Twenty-nine U.S. states and the District This work was supported by

Abstract-More than 1.3 billion people in the world lack access to electricity and this energy poverty is a major barrier to human development. This paper describes a new concept of peer-to-peer electricity sharing which creates a marketplace for electricity. In this marketplace, the people who can afford power generating sources such as solar panels can sell electricity to people who are unable to afford generating sources or who might have access to electricity but require more electricity at certain times. These adhoc microgrids created by sharing of resources provide affordable electricity and are enabled by a Power Management Unit (PMU) described in this paper.

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