A solid state contactor or circuit breaker consists of three main elements: a low on-stage voltage main power semiconductor, an energy absorption device (ZnO varistors in general) and a snubber ("C" or "RCD") which is only necessary for power devices having limited RBSOA. ZnO varistors have high peak current and energy absorption capabilities. However, they give not only high clamping factor but also voltage spike at the beginning of clamping, thereby greatly increasing the requirement in main power switch breakdown voltage. In this paper, we propose an active energy absorption device which allows controllable clamping factor and constant clamping voltage and does not have the ZnO's voltage spike. Therefore it can be another alternative for energy dissipation in solid state interruption. The proposed device can also be associated with ZnO varistors to achieve a combined device, enabling high clamping performance as well as high energy dissipation capability.
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