Active thermal control for delaying maintenance of power electronics converters

Abstract

Several studies have reported about power semiconductors and capacitors being the most sensitive components in power converters. The lifetime of these devices is associated with the mission profile and the resulting temperature profile. For preventing failures, it is of interest to estimate the Remaining Useful Lifetime(RUL) and several condition monitoring methods have been proposed for this purpose. Moreover, modular power converters consist of a high number of components and methods have been proposed to reduce the thermal stress and therefore extend the lifetime of a system with software, referred to as active thermal control. For power converters with limited accessibility, the RUL detected by the condition monitoring system may not fit to the scheduled maintenance of the system and devices may still have a significant RUL when their replacement is scheduled. Therefore, this work proposes to control the stress of the most deteriorated components in the system such that the failure probability of multiple building blocks is equalized when the next maintenance is scheduled. Moreover, this concept is proposed to extend the time to the next maintenance and reduce the number of maintenance instances without affecting the mean lifetime of the system.

Power Converters Coolant: Past, Present, Future, and a Path Toward Active Thermal Control in Electrified Ship Power Systems

“…The effect of power routing on the aging of the ST's ten parallel connected DAB cells is investigated in [89]. The finding from this study is depicted in Figure 24.…”

“…Figure 24a illustrates the damage sustained by the DAB cells while sharing the power equally for 400 months. The first The impact of power routing on the aging of DAB cells [89] breakdown occurs in the 200th month, and the last occurs in the 370th month, leading to several interruptions in regular operation due to maintenance intervals. However, while the power routing algorithm is implemented, the breakdown of all cells occurs in the 293rd month (Figure 24b), which reduces the maintenance intervals.…”

Emerging Trends and Challenges in Thermal Management of Power Electronic Converters: A State of the Art Review

“…A study conducted in [72] examined how power routing influences the aging of a set of 10 parallel-connected DAB cells within a smart transformer. Another study conducted by Liserre et al [66] demonstrated the efficacy of power routing in mitigating the thermal cycling effects on the most deteriorated cells within the low-voltage conversion stage of a smart transformer (ST).…”