A behavioral transient model of IGBT for switching cell power loss estimation in electromagnetic transient simulation

The paper presents an improved Behavioral Transient Model (BTM) of IGBT with anti-parallel freewheeling diode. This model combines advantages of both existing physical and behavioral model considering the dynamic behavior of IGBT and the reverse recovery characteristics of the diode. Power Loss Estimation Method (PLEM) for switching cell is further proposed to obtain the loss table under various operating conditions. In addition to traditional modeling techniques which only uses ideal switch for the circuit simulation, this paper uses PLEM to replicate the loss behavior of semiconductor devices. This results faster simulation speed and at the same time guarantees higher accuracy. This approach is promising for high frequency power loss estimation, cooling system design optimization and semiconductor selection. The proposed model is implemented in PSCAD/EMTDC and look-up table is used for power loss estimation in circuit simulation. The parameters for the model are mainly extracted from the device datasheet. Further, this has been verified by experimental results using double pulse test bench.