Economics of High Efficiency SiC MOSFET based 3-ph Motor Drive

Inhalt:
The purpose of this paper is to illustrate the performance advantages and cost savings that a silicon carbide (SiC) six-pack MOSFET module can bring to variable speed motor drives. Motor drive inverters represent just one of the many hard switched topologies that can benefit from SiC MOSFETs and diodes. In this paper, the performance of a SiC six-pack MOSFET module based motor drive inverter will be compared with an equivalent silicon (Si) six-pack IGBT module (same physical package) based motor drive inverter operating under the same conditions. The cost benefits of using the SiC module will be explored as well as potential concerns due to increased dv/dt will be discussed.