Advanced Power Electronics and Electric Machines for Electric-Drive Mobility Applications

Electronics, power electronics, and electric machines are becoming important for an array of mobility/transportation, renewable energy and energy efficiency applications. In this presentation, I will provide an introduction to NREL and my group’s research activities. Then, I will describe some challenges and opportunities for power electronics, electric machines and electric traction drive systems for mobility applications in particular. The first area covered in detail will be power electronics thermal management with water-ethylene glycol and dielectric fluids in the single-phase liquid regime and dielectric fluids/refrigerants in the two-phase/boiling regime. The second area will be power electronics materials and bonded interfaces including efforts on sintered silver, sintered copper, polyamide- and polyimide-based bonded interface materials, and polyimide-based electrically insulating materials. Some advanced power electronics packaging concepts will also be introduced. I will then cover our group’s efforts related to electric motor thermal management with focus on motor materials and interfaces thermal modeling and characterization, fluid-based cooling technologies development and characterization, and thermal-fluids modeling to help design and develop advanced reduced-rare-earth electric motors. Finally, I will present our efforts related to integrated electric drive system approaches and thermal management in support of these integration approaches.
Speaker(s): Sreekant Narumanchi,
SEMI World Hdqtrs, 673 South Milpitas Blvd, Milpitas, California, United States, 95035, Virtual: https://events.vtools.ieee.org/m/363151