Design and analysis of an isolated bidirectional DC/DC converter with wide band-gap devices for a fuel cell vehicle

Abstract

The objective of this paper is to design and simulate an isolated bidirectional DC/DC converter, which has been recently incorporated in a Fuel Cell Electric Vehicles (FCEV), to interface a battery with the (FCEV) system. In the (FCEV) with an energy storage such as a battery. The fuel cell is the principal source providing the most power required by the traction motor. The battery, as an additional source, assists the fuel cell to fed the traction motor because of the slow dynamics of the fuel cell system and it can store also the energy during braking phases, in this case the use of bidirectional DC/DC converter is necessary to manage the power flux between the battery and the other parts of the system. Moreover, wide band-gap devices (WBG) have been considered due to their obvious advantages and their superior characteristics in various aspects that lead to better operating performance.