Design and Analyse of Silicon Carbide JFET Based Inverter

摘要

This paper presents the design and testing of a high frequency, high efficiency inverter using silicon carbide (SiC) JFET power module. A rugged negative voltage gate drive circuit is used to solve the normally on problem of JFET devices and avoid the bridge shot-through during power on or power off. The circuit can provide over-voltage protection, over current protection and over temperature protection circuits to ensure the safe operation of the SiC JFET module and the resultant inverter system. The simulation and measurement results show that SiC JFETs have short turn-on and turn-off times, which will result in lower switching losses than silicon (Si) IGBTs. The low on-resistance in SiC JFETs will result in lower conduction losses. The experiment results of a 1kW SiC JFET-based inverter showed 3% efficiency improvement by a SiC JFET-based inverter over a Si IGBT- based inverter.