Impact of next-generation 1700V SiC MOSFETs in a 125kW PV converter

1700V SiC modules were built with next-generation SiC MOSFETs, with 25°C R
_DSON
per MOSFET cut approximately 50% from existing commercial SiC MOSFETs. Additionally, the external SiC anti-parallel diode was eliminated in favor of using the SiC MOSFET body diode during the dead time. The resulting 1700V SiC module used only 32% of the SiC chip area, yet reduced the 25°C module R
_DSON
from 8mΩ to 5mΩ, and increased the current rating at operating temperature from 225A to 300A, compared to the previous generation module. Additionally, using a 125kW PV converter switching at 30kHz to benchmark the technologies, both generations of 1700V SiC modules were found to be approximately equal in system efficiency at 99%, +/-0.1%.