Ripple Current and Electrical Noise Characterization of DC BUS Capacitors for Future Power Electronics

Teppei Akiyoshi Murata Manufacturing Co. Ltd, Japan / Materials Research Institute, Pennsylvania State University
aut12@psu.edu

Guanghui Wang, Heath Hofmann Electrical Engineering Department, Pennsylvania State University
giw2@psu.edu

Mike Lanagan Materials Research Institute, Pennsylvania State University 278 Materials Research Laboratory Building University Park, PA 16802 phone: 814-865-6992
mxl46@psu.edu Abstract For automotive applications there is an increasing demand to miniaturize power electronics circuits and operate at higher temperatures. Active SiC-based devices operate at high frequency which decreases circuit dimensions. Passive components, such as the DC-BUS capacitor, must complement new SiC technology. In this study the high frequency performance of DC-BUS capacitors in a DC-DC converter was tested. The relationship between ripple voltage and ripple current were explored as a function of switching frequency (fs) and total DC-BUS capacitance. The DC-BUS capacitors charging and discharging current was independent of the capacitance or switching frequency. The calculated necessary capacitance for DC-BUS capacitor was proportional to 1/fs and 1/fs2 by assuming constraining condition of ripple voltage and ripple current, respectively. In addition, to minimize the DC-BUS capacitor size, the current density through the capacitor was calculated as proportional to fs and fs2 by assuming constraining condition of ripple voltage and ripple current, respectively. Therefore, high current density performance will be important to miniaturize power electronic circuits by increasing switching frequency. DC-BUS current and DC-BUS voltage noise increased with increasing switching frequency over a wide frequency range. The benefit of using a multilayer ceramic capacitor (MLCC) to reduce noise was demonstrated. Introduction Nowadays power electronics are widely used to achieve high energy efficiency in energy conversion for concerning energy savings. EV (Electric Vehicles), HEV (Hybrid Electric Vehicles), and FCV (Fuel Cell Vehicles) are also using this technology to drive motors. Presently Si-based semiconductors are normally used for switching devices (ex. IGBT or
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MOSFET). IGBTs are common for motor drives in vehicles and the typical switching frequency is 10-30 kHz. Switching devices are not ideal and power loss is associated with each switching cycle (turn on and turn off), heating switching device and decreasing efficiency. The theoretical switching frequency limit for Si-based semiconductors is being approached for commercial switching devices.1 On the other hand, SiC-semiconductor has received great interest2, 3, 4, because the physical properties enable power electronics to achieve higher energy efficiency and higher energy density.. Table 1 shows the physical properties of SiC polytypes compare to of Si. Large band gap allows operation in higher temperature, and with its high thermal conductivity, simple cooling system can be used. For SiC, the dopant concentration can be higher than Si the drift region can be thinner because of SiCs higher breakdown strength, resulting in lower on-state resistance. The higher saturated electron velocity for SiC switching devices is also expected to achieve lower on-state resistance than for equivalent Si devices. This means lower power loss and higher efficiency in future SiC-based unipolar devices along with excellent switching characteristics in the medium power range2. SiC semiconductors allow for higher switching frequency than for Si-based devices1. One of the primary benefits for higher switching frequency is size reduction of passive components. In addition, the SiCs superior properties may reduce the need for a snubber circuit which causes additional losses. Future passive components must match SiCs performance and the focus of this work is to evaluate multilayer ceramic capacitors for high frequency power switching circuits. Table 1 Physical properties of semiconductors 4H-SiC Band Gap (eV) Breakdown Electric Field (MV/cm) Electron mobility (cm2/V*s) (theoretical) Saturated electron velocity (107 cm/s) Thermal Conductivity (W/cm*K @RT) 3.26
S

6H-SiC 3.03
C

3C-SiC 2.23 2H 600 H (650 I) 2.5 H 4.5 H

H

Si 1.12 C 0.25 C 1400 S 1C 1.5 C

2.2 S (950 I) 2S 3.3 S

2.4 C (420 I) 2C 3~3.8 C

References: S: SiCED home page (http://www.siced.de) C: CREE home page (http://www.cree.com) H: HOYA home page (http://hoya-live.ashleyassociates.co.jp) I: Roschke M, Schwierz F, IEEE Trans. Electron. Devices, vol. 48, No. 7, p. 1442, 2001.

Experiment Circuit A DC-DC buck converter was used to study the DC-BUS capacitor performance because of its simplicity and similarity with automotive inverters with respect to DC-BUS operation. The
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schematic diagram of the circuit of DC-DC buck converter used for this study is shown in Fig. 1. The IGBT and the diode are packaged in a single module (half-bridge n-channel IGBT module, GTR MG50Q2YS9, TOSHIBA Co.). The power source was a series of two lead-acid batteries. The inductance of input side (Li) is attributed to stray inductance of the connection between IGTB terminals and batteries. To highlight the role of DC-BUS capacitor, a specific inductance to reduce DC-BUS noise was not used and snubber circuits were not used. Inductor Lout and capacitor Cout were about 1.2 m H and 460 u F, respectively. The load was 2 so the output power with 50 % duty cycle was about 70 Watts. Multi-layered ceramic capacitors (MLCCs) were tested (Ci) with specifications of 50 u F, 500 V withstand voltage, and 25 A current rating as a DC-BUS capacitor. Single MLCC and two MLCCs in parallel were tested. The MLCC prototype was produced by Murata MFG. Co., Ltd. and 10 k Hz, 20 k Hz, and 50 k Hz were chosen for the switching frequency of DC-DC converter, and the duty cycle was fixed at 50 %.

Fig. 1 Schematic diagram of the circuit to test DC-BUS capacitor Measurement To measure the DC-BUS capacitor charging and discharging current, a current transformer (current monitor model 5046, Pearson, 0.5 Hz to 20 M Hz @+- 3 db) was used. The current monitor was placed on 1.5 long copper conductors with stray inductance of about 40 n H that were used to connect IGBT module and DC-BUS capacitor. The DC-BUS capacitor was not in ideal position, owing to the stray inductance that influenced the noise absorption capability. To measure the DC-BUS current, Hall Effect current sensor (A6302 and A503B, Tektronix, DC to 50 M Hz) was used. Voltage measuring points are shown in Fig.2. The voltage probes (P5200, Tektronix) and current monitors were connected to an oscilloscope (TDS754D, Tektronix) and the data was collected for 0.4 m sec by computer through GPIB connection with 250 M Hz sampling frequency.

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Calculation of ripple and noise parameters Discrete Fourier Transform (DFT) was utilized to distinguish current and voltage ripples and noise. Frequency distributions of the noise spectrum were derived by DFT. After application of Fourier Transform, data for the fundamental switching frequency and the harmonics were extracted. The data was cut off by 70 M Hz, and inverse Fourier Transform was applied to obtain wave form with reduced measurement noise. Results and Discussion General wave forms and definitions Fig.2 is the general wave form of a DC-DC buck converter in continuous conduction mode. (vCi) is DC-BUS capacitor voltage that represents DC-BUS voltage, (vIGBT) is the voltage between emitter and collector of IGBT, (iCi) is the charging current of DC-BUS capacitor, and (iLi) is the current through DC-BUS. While a cycle of IGBT switching (on and off), vCi and iLi were almost maintained constant by charging and discharging the DC-BUS capacitor.

Fig. 2 Transients of DC-BUS capacitor voltage (vCi) voltage between drain and source (vIGBT) DC-BUS capacitors charging current (iCi) and DC-BUS current (iLi) with 100 u F DC-BUS capacitor in 50 k Hz switching frequency operation.

Fig. 3 The DC-BUS capacitor voltage (vCi) and DC-BUS current (iLi) from Fig.2 at a refined scale.
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The fluctuations of vCi and iLi caused by switching frequency are called ripple voltage and current, and spikes and ringing induced by switching transient is defined as noise. By applying Fourier Transform, the magnitude of ripple corresponds to the magnitude of the elemental wave. The deviations from sine wave are expressed by higher order harmonics. On the other hand, noise is converted to much higher order harmonics, and its frequencies depend on the frequency of ringing or spikes. Fig.4 shows the waveforms with switching frequency of 10 k Hz and DC-BUS capacitance of 50 u F. The lack of capacitance causes a large distortion of BUS current at the switching frequency. Actual applications should avoid this region because of strong EMI emissions and noise propagation or increasing ohmic loss in the DC-BUS.

Fig. 4 The transients of DC-BUS voltage (vCi), voltage between drain and source (vIGBT), the capacitors charging current (iCi), and DC-BUS current (iLi) with 50 u F DC-BUS capacitor in 10 kHz switching frequency operation. Calculation of Ripple Current and Voltage Magnitude By assuming a nearly constant DC-BUS current (iLi = ILi), DC-BUS capacitor voltage (vCi) can be expressed as vCi = Q/C = 1/C ILi dt + v0 = 1/C * ILi ( t1 - t0 ) + v0 , Equation 1 Where t1 and to define the capacitor charging interval and vo is the initial capacitor voltage. As shown in Eq. 1, the DC-BUS capacitor voltage changes linearly by constant charging or discharging current while IGBT is in the on or off state. Expressed in another way, if the time constant of the capacitor is significantly longer than the period of charging or discharging for the IGBT, then the capacitor voltage is assumed to be linear with time. Thus, the DC-BUS capacitor voltage changes as a triangular wave as shown in upper diagram
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in Fig.5. The DC-BUS voltage ripple (VCi)is related to capacitance and frequency: 1 / Ci (Ci : capacitance of DC-BUS capacitor), and Vci Equation 2 1 / fs (fs : switching frequency). Equation Vci

The ripple of DC-BUS current (ILi) can be derived from DC-BUS voltage transient. The voltage across DC-BUS inductance (vLi) (in this case, its a parasitic inductance) is expressed 4 vLi = Li (diL / dt) (Li : parasitic inductance of DC-BUS) Equation

, which can also be expressed by applying Kirchhoffs law to the gray circle in Fig.6, 5 Thus, vLi = Vd vci (Vd : the voltage of DC source) Equation

diLi / dt = ( Vd vci ) / Li Equation 6 ILi = 1 / Li ( Vd vc ) dt Equation 7 The relationship between vci and iLi are shown in Fig.5, which demonstrates that, iLi is proportional to the area of triangle in Fig.7, so 1 / fs 2 ILi Equation 8 1 / Ci ILi Equation 9

Fig. 5 The explanatory diagram of VCi and iLi.

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Fig. 6 The circuit diagram defining the voltage path through the parasitic inductor, through which Kirchhoffs law was applied.

Fig. 7 Defining the voltage transient and ILi. Experimental Results: Ripple Current and Voltage Fig. 8 shows the experimental ripple voltage data for a DC-BUS capacitor, which are inversely proportional to the switching frequency and the capacitance of DC-BUS capacitor. The graphs are plotted as linear relationships, to be consistent with Equations 2 and 3. The data with switching frequency of 10 k Hz was not commensurate with the criteria that the switching period is significantly shorter that the circuit time constant for the DC-BUS capacitor.

Fig. 8 Experimental results of the fundamental waves magnitude of DC-BUS capacitor voltage with respect to the inverse of the switching frequency (left) or with respect to the inverse of the capacitance (right).
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Fig.9 shows the experimental ripple current data for a DC-BUS capacitor, which are inversely proportional to the square of the switching frequency and the inverse of capacitance of DC-BUS capacitor. The graphs are plotted as linear relationships, to be consistent with Equations 8 and 9. The data with switching frequency of 10 k Hz cannot meet the relation, because of the same reason for the ripple voltage of DC-BUS capacitor.

Fig. 9 Experimental results of the fundamental waves magnitude of DC-BUS current with respect to the inverse of the square of switching frequency (left) of with respect to the inverse of the capacitance (right). Fig. 10 shows the relationship between the switching frequency and the charging current of the DC-BUS capacitor with 50 u F and 100 u F. As observed in Fig.10, the DC-BUS capacitors charging current is not changed by switching frequency and capacitance, within reasonable combinations of capacitance and switching frequency.

Fig. 10 Experimental results of the fundamental waves magnitude of DC-BUS capacitors charging current with respect to the switching frequency.
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Size reduction of DC-BUS capacitor by switching frequency From the approximate line of 100 uF or 50 kHz in Fig.8 and Fig.9, we can obtain the following equations for this circuit and conditions. C > 0.4 / (Vlimit x fs ) C > 7 x 103 / (Ilimit x fs2 ) (Vlimit : permissible ripple of BUS voltage) (Ilimit : permissible ripple of BUS current )

Fig.11 (left) defines the relationship between switching frequency and the necessary DC-BUS capacitance to limit the ripple voltage and current within a specified range. If the constraining condition is the ripple voltage of DC-BUS, we can reduce capacitance of DC-BUS capacitor by increasing switching frequency by first order. If the constraining condition is ripple current in DC-BUS, we can reduce capacitance of DC-BUS capacitor by increasing switching frequency by 2nd order. Fig.11 (right) expresses the relationship between switching frequency and current density through DC-BUS capacitor. This calculation is assuming that the capacitors capacitance is chosen by relationship expressed in Fig.11(left). By increasing switching frequency, we can reduce the capacitance of DC-BUS capacitor, but this means increasing of current density in the capacitor, because the charging current of DC-BUS capacitor is independent on switching frequency and capacitance. To miniaturize power electronic circuits by increasing switching frequency, high current density performance is necessary for DC-BUS capacitors.

Fig. 11 The calculated example of necessary capacitance for adequate ripple current and ripple voltage suppression (left), and DC-BUS capacitors current density for minimum capacitance choice (right). Note: These figures are calculated as an example with the conditions of the specific circuit used in this study. The intercepts of each line can be changed by specific circuit set up and varied with conditions like inductance of the DC-BUS. However, the slopes of the lines can be generalized to a broad range of power circuits.

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Experimental noise data Fig.12 shows the spectra of voltage between DC-BUS capacitor terminals in frequency domain. The noise spectrum in Fig.12 is presented without DC component, fundamental switching frequency, which represents ripple current, and some harmonics below 60 k Hz, that were over 0.014 V rms. In this figure, a small voltage scale is required to observe the noise spectrum. It is obvious that the noise increases by increasing switching frequency over a wide frequency range.

Fig. 12 Voltage noise spectrum between terminals of DC-BUS capacitor with various switching frequencies.

Fig. 13 Current noise spectrum of DC-BUS with 20 k Hz and 50 k Hz switching frequencies. Note that this result doesnt represent the performance of the MLCC, because of the long conductor between the MLCC and the IGBT module to measure capacitor current. Current noise spectra of DC-BUS are shown in Fi.13 without DC component, fundamental frequency, which represents ripple, and few harmonics below 60 k Hz, that were over 0.004 A
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rms. The sharp peak around 10 M Hz is corresponding to the ringing frequency. The noise increased by increasing switching frequency in the same manner as the voltage. By increasing switching frequency, noises of DC-BUS voltage and DC-BUS current were increased. These pronounced noise from the DC-BUS current can lead to EMI emissions. Mitigating increasing noise In order to miniaturize the power electronics circuit by increasing switching frequency, better noise reduction is necessary. One way to reduce noise is to add another smaller capacitor close to the switching module. However, additional components cause further ringing and EMI emissions. Fig.15 is the example of DC-BUS capacitor current obtained from a DC-DC converter (Fig.14). By adding small capacitor close to the IGBT, additional ringing between two capacitors was induced.

Fig. 14 Schematic diagram of DC-DC converter for the results of Fig.

Fig. 15 Charging current of DC-BUS capacitor (the electrolytic capacitor of 2000 u F in Fig. ) with or without adding smaller capacitor. A more straightforward modification is to choose DC-BUS capacitor with lower ESL and to optimize the layout of DC-BUS capacitor. Polymer Film capacitors were chosen from capacitors that have almost the same withstanding voltage and current rating as the MLCC. The specifications are shown in Table 2.
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Fig. 16 (left) is the result of DC-BUS capacitor voltage measured at the same points between capacitor and IGBT module, with several types of capacitors for DC-BUS capacitor. The fundamental wave, that is 50 k Hz, is the ripple and its magnitude depends on the capacitance. But most of the higher order harmonics are representing noises, and MLCC had the best result for minimizing the noises. Additional result is shown in Fig.16 (right). These data were measured at the roots of capacitors extraction electrodes. So, now we can compare the capacitor performances without layout merit comes from its size. As you can see, noises of polymer films are smaller from Fig.16 (left), but still MLCC has better result. These results come from MLCCs smaller ESL (Table 2). The MLCC as a DC-BUS capacitor provides and excellent solution to reduce noise at high switching frequency.

Table 2

Specifications of the capacitors. The specifications of polymer films are from their catalogue.

Fig. 16 Voltage spectra of DC-BUS measured between middle points of DC-BUS capacitor and IGBT module (left), and measured between roots of DC-BUS capacitor terminals (right). (Switching frequency: 50 k Hz, Duty ratio: 50%, source voltage: 24 V, Li: 0.4 m H, Lo: 1.4 m H.)
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Conclusions and future work In summary, the ripple current and voltage were characterized in a DC-DC buck converter in order to determine the effects of frequency and capacitance on their magnitudes. The necessary capacitance of DC-BUS capacitor to limit the magnitude of ripple of DC-BUS voltage or current can be reduced by increasing switching frequency. The necessary capacitance (Cmin) is derived as follows. 1 / fs (when constraining condition is DC-BUS ripple voltage) Cmin 1 / fs2 (when constraining condition is DC-BUS ripple current) Cmin The capacitor size decreases with increasing switching frequency, however the charging and discharging current does not change with frequency and capacitance, therefore the current density through the DC-BUS capacitor increases. Future capacitor technology will need to address higher current density for high frequency operation. By increasing switching frequency, noise increased. One benefit of using a MLCC as DC-BUS capacitor is a better performance to reduce noise than other capacitor technology, because of its low ESL. Future work will confirm these results in high switching frequency (100 k Hz) and high power (tens kilo VA) MOSFET circuits and explore the capacitor performance especially about heating or current and voltage allowance as a function under actual circuit conditions.

Acknowledgment The authors acknowledge the financial support of Murata Manufacturing Company and the National Science Foundation supported Center for Dielectric Studies at Penn State University.

References 1) B. J. Baliga, Power semiconductor device figure of merit for high-frequency applications, IEEE Electron Device Lett., vol. 10, p. 455, 1989. 2) M. Bhatnagar and B. J. Baliga, IEEE Trans. Electron. Devices, vol. 40, No. 3, pp.645, 1993 3) J. A. Cooper, Jr., M. R. Melloch, R. Singh, A. Agarwal, and J. W. Palmour, Status and Prospects for SiC Power MOSFETs, IEEE Trans. Electron. Devices, vol. 49, No. 4, pp.658, 2002 4) Alex Q. Huang and Bo Zhang, Comparing SiC switching power devices: MOSFET, NPN transistor and GTO thyristor , Solid-State Electronics 44 (2000) 325-340

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