A SiC-based power converter module for medium-voltage fast charger for plug-in electric vehicles

This paper presents an isolated power converter module for medium-voltage (2.4 kV), high-power-quality (PF ≥ 0.98, current THD ≤ 2%), 50 kW fast charger for plug-in electric vehicles. The proposed high-efficiency (above 96%), and reduced-footprint converter module utilizes off-the-shelf Silicon Carbide (SiC) devices to step down the rectified single-phase medium-voltage input. The developed module can also serve as a building block for other medium voltage rectifier applications, including power supplies for data centers and other dc power distribution systems. Based on the system requirements, the appropriate unidirectional converter topology was selected, its operation was simulated and validated by experiments on the developed converter prototype.