| Abstract |
In recent years, the automotive and aerospace industries have brought stringent reliability constraints on power electronic converters because of safety requirements. Today customers of many power electronic products expect up to 20 years (or even longer) of lifetime and they also want to have a 'failure free period' and all with focus on the financials. The renewable energy sectors are also following the same trend, and more and more efforts are being devoted to improving power electronic converters to account for reliability with cost-effective and sustainable solutions. This presentation will introduce the recent progress in the reliability aspect study of power electronic converters for power electronic applications with special focus on renewables. It will cover the following contents: the motivations for highly reliable electric energy conversion in renewables; the reliability requirements of typical power electronic systems; failure mechanisms and lifetime models of key power electronic components (e.g., power semiconductor switches, capacitors, and fans); long-term mission profiles in renewable applications and their components; reliability analysis methods for more complicated systems, tools to be applied, and improvement strategies of power electronic converters in their applications. A few case studies will be given. |
