Highly Compact Partial Power Converter for a Highly Efficient PV-BESS Stacked Generation System
The inherently intermittent nature of photovoltaic (PV) energy has brought increasing interest towards the integration between PV sources and Battery Energy Storage Systems (BESS). In this paper, a Series Partial Power Processing (PPP) converter based on Capacitive Power Transfer (CPT) is proposed to integrate PV and BESS in a grid-connected inverter system. The proposed converter has been simulated according to a PV string capable to provide 1430 W under full irradiance conditions, a BESS nominal voltage equal to 215 V and a solar inverter assumed to operate with a minimum voltage of 150 V and a maximum current of 10 A. Simulation tests carried out at different conditions of solar radiatio…
Power Bus Management Techniques for Space Missions in Low Earth Orbit
In space vehicles, the typical configurations for the Solar Array Power Regulators in charge of managing power transfer from the solar array to the power bus are quite different from the corresponding devices in use for terrestrial applications. A thorough analysis is reported for the most popular approaches, namely Sequential Switching Shunt Regulation and parallel-input Pulse Width Modulated converters with Maximum Power Point Tracking. Their performance is compared with reference to a typical mission in low Earth orbit, highlighting the respective strengths and weaknesses. A novel solar array managing technique, the Sequential Maximum Power Tracking, is also introduced in the trade-off a…
Highly Efficient Capacitive Galvanic Isolation for EV Charging Stations
This paper proposes an isolated Switched Capacitor (SC) power converter which provides galvanic isolation through Capacitive Power Transfer (CPT). The combination of these two technologies might answer for electrical and power requirements in different electrical mobility application fields, such as battery charging. Accordingly, due to the low conversion losses the combination of these two technologies can provide, compact, cost effective and highly efficient power converters can be derived, thus potentially answering the scalability requirements for the Electric Vehicles (EV) market. To assess the operation of the proposed circuital solution, a Full Bridge (FB) CPT isolated interfacing co…