High-Speed Peltier Calorimeter for the Calibration of High-Bandwidth Power Measurement Equipment

Accurate power measurements of electronic components operating at high frequencies are vital in determining where power losses occur in a system such as a power converter. Such power measurements must be carried out with equipment that can accurately measure real power at high frequency. To address this requirement, we present the design of a high-speed calorimeter capable of reaching a steady state in less than 10 min. The system uses Peltier thermoelectric coolers to remove heat generated in a load resistance and was calibrated against known real power measurements using an artificial neural network. A dead-zone controller was used to achieve stable power measurements. The calibration was validated and shown to have an absolute accuracy of ±8 mW (95% confidence interval) for measurements of real power from 0.1 to 5 W.