Application of Power Semiconductor to Direct-Current Interruption and Evaluaation of Current Interruption Performance

2022 Fiscal Year Final Research Report

• Project/Area Number: 20H02130
• Research Category: Grant-in-Aid for Scientific Research (B)
• Allocation Type: Single-year Grants
• Section: 一般
• Review Section: Basic Section 21010:Power engineering-related
• Research Institution: Nagoya University
• Principal Investigator: Yokomizu Yasunobu 名古屋大学, 工学研究科, 教授 (50230652)
• Project Period (FY): 2020-04-01 – 2023-03-31
• Keywords: 直流遮断 / パワー半導体素子 / 限流

Outline of Final Research Achievements

Application of a wide gap power semiconductor (SiC MOS-FET) to low-voltage direct-current interruption has been researched to propose a model low-voltage DC circuit breaker that functions limitation and interruption of the DC and to devise the circuit configuration in the model circuit breaker.
One of the proposed circuit breaker has two units: a current limitation unit composed of a semiconductor and a resistor and a current breaking unit composed of a semiconductor. Transient current and voltage across the power semiconductor were shown during the current breaking process with the model circuit breaker. In addition, P/N junction temperature rise during the current breaking process was also evaluated, based on Cauer thermal circuit constructed in this research. As other of the current breaking way, a method was devised to transform from the DC into a damping oscillating current method. The circuit configuration that achieves this transformation method was furthermore shown.

Free Research Field

大電流工学，高温工学，電力工学

Academic Significance and Societal Importance of the Research Achievements

現在のDC伝送システムでは，アーク放電の過渡推移を利用した遮断器が，負荷電流の開閉および故障電流の遮断を行っている。現在の遮断器の基本設計は，アーク放電の抵抗を高速上昇することによって，直流電流を限流遮断させることである。しかし，アーク抵抗の高速上昇を目指しても，以下に示す要素に依存してしまい，困難に直面する。(i) アーク抵抗の過渡応答は，多くのアーク要素現象に影響され，目標値を達成しにくい。(ii) 限流遮断時間の短縮化を目指しても，アーク特性に左右されてしまい，所定値を実現することが困難である。