Integrated power electronics modules: Electro-thermal modeling flow and stress conditions overview

In recent years, power electronics solutions spread through fields ever less tied to a pure industrial context for embracing on-coming applications in consumer, automotive and renewable energy markets. In all those contexts several requirements drive engineers in implementing assemblies having increasingly strict constraints as high power density, optimal management of temperature, and a more and more compact and mechanically robust structure, so to guarantee a good degree of integration in the host system. In applications where the power to be managed is significant (tens to hundreds of kW), Integrated Power Electronics Modules (IPEMs) play a major role. These solutions, already extensively industrialized, well satisfy the above mentioned integration requirements, and allow the final customer to reduce power-management costs. In order to design an IPEM able to satisfy all the requirements it is necessary to have preliminary CAD models able to predict its behavior from several points of view. In this work, a layered modeling flow able to take into account both the electrical and thermal behavior is detailed. Moreover, a series of issues able to produce prospective mechanical stresses and related failure conditions are discussed.