A Review of Power Electronic Devices for Heavy Goods Vehicles Electrification: Performance and Reliability

This review explores the performance and reliability of power semiconductor devices required to enable the electrification of heavy goods vehicles (HGVs). HGV electrification can be implemented using (i) batteries charged with ultra-rapid DC charging (350 kW and above); (ii) road electrification with overhead catenaries supplying power through a pantograph to the HGV powertrain; (iii) hydrogen supplying power to the powertrain through a fuel cell; (iv) any combination of the first three technologies. At the heart of the HGV powertrain is the power converter implemented through power semiconductor devices. Given that the HGV powertrain is rated typically between 500 kW and 1 MW, power devices with voltage ratings between 650 V and 1200 V are required for the off-board/on-board charger’s rectifier and DC-DC converter as well as the powertrain DC-AC traction inverter. The power devices available for HGV electrification at 650 V and 1.2 kV levels are SiC planar MOSFETs, SiC Trench MOSFETs, silicon super-junction MOSFETs, SiC Cascode JFETs, GaN HEMTs, GaN Cascode HEMTs and silicon IGBTs. The MOSFETs can be implemented with anti-parallel SiC Schottky diodes or can rely on their body diodes for third quadrant operation. This review examines the various power semiconductor technologies in terms of losses, electrothermal ruggedness under short circuits, avalanche ruggedness, body diode and conduction performance.