A Thorough Review of Cooling Concepts and Thermal Management Techniques for Automotive WBG Inverters: Topology, Technology and Integration Level

Abstract

The development of electric vehicles (EVs) is an important step towards clean and green cities. An electric powertrain provides power to the vehicle and consists of a charger, a battery, an inverter, and a motor as the main components. Supplied by a battery pack, the automotive inverter manages the power of the motor. EVs require a highly efficient inverter, which satisfies low cost, size, and weight requirements. One approach to meeting these requirements is to use the new wide-bandgap (WBG) semiconductors, which are being widely investigated in the industry as an alternative to silicon switches. WBG devices have superior intrinsic properties, such as high thermal flux, of up to 120 W/cm2 (on average); junction temperature of 175–200 °C; blocking voltage limit of about 6.5 kV; switching frequency about 20-fold higher than that of Si; and up to 73% lower switching losses with a lower conduction voltage drop. This study presents a review of WBG-based inverter cooling systems to investigate trends in cooling techniques and changes associated with the use of WBG devices. The aim is to consider suitable cooling techniques for WBG inverters at different power levels.

The role of power device technology in the electric vehicle powertrain

“…The introduction of new devices, assembly methods, and manufacturing techniques is contributing to the increase in power density 232 . Generally speaking, the effects of constant heating/cooling cycles required by the electric vehicle application need to be mitigated to meet power‐density and system‐reliability requirements making it necessary to use liquid cooling systems.…”

Thermal Management Technologies Used for High Heat Flux Automobiles and Aircraft: A Review

“…As far as the cold plate technique is concerned, the single-phase cold plate and the two-phase cold plate are usually categorized by the presence of a phase change of working fluid. Since the heat dissipation capability of the cold plate is strongly dependent on the cold plate channel configuration, many types of cold plates with different channel structures were developed to improve the thermal performance in the last decades [31,36,63]. Depending on the available exterior surfaces for heat dissipation, a one-sided cooling cold plate or double-sided cooling cold plate can be designed.…”

“…Depending on the available exterior surfaces for heat dissipation, a one-sided cooling cold plate or double-sided cooling cold plate can be designed. Figure 5 shows the schematics of three typical single-sided liquid cooling structures (including straight channel structure, serpentine channel structure, and pin fin structure) and one double-sided liquid cooling structure [36]. In general, water-ethylene glycol is used as the coolant in the single-phase liquid cooling system in automobiles, while fuel and polyalphaolefin are usually adopted in the liquid cooling loops of aircraft.…”

A Review of Select Patented Technologies for Cooling of High Heat Flux Power Semiconductor Devices

“…E-mail: eric.dede@toyota.com Direct cooling of a chip [18], [27], [33] power electronics that exhibit higher possible switching frequencies, reduced switching losses, smaller passive sizes, and greater operational temperatures. These performance benefits nonetheless lead to technical challenges associated with the control of the power device itself, subsequent circuit response, temperature capability of package materials [12], and cooling of packages plus devices having higher power density [13]- [15]. Therefore, in the same late-2000 timing, a comprehensive patent literature search for electronics cooling technologies was conducted to understand established approaches, the latest state-of-the-art, and possible future research directions.…”