IEEE Power Electronics Magazine - June 2022 - 4

From the Editor
by Ashok Bindra
Exploring Wired and Wireless
EV Charging Technologies
D
espite global efforts, CO2
emissions, along with other
harmful gases, continue to
rise and transportation is a big contributor
to this global warming concern.
As a result, to reduce these harmful
emissions, governments and policymakers
around the world are pushing
the adoption of electrified vehicles
(EVs) via a variety of incentives. Subsequently,
for passenger vehicles only,
EVs are forecasted to reach 80 million
cars in the U.S. and around 500 million
globally by 2040.
In the cover feature " Charging
Electric Vehicles: Wired and Wireless
Power Transfer " of this issue of IEEE
Power Electronics Magazine, written
by Hua(Kevin) Bai, Daniel Costinett,
Leon M. Tolbert, Ruiyang Qin, Liyan
Zhu, Ziwei Liang, and Yang Huan,
the authors identify key enablers
for such rapid EV adoption. These
include improvement of battery energy
density, life span and safety,
and drastic cost reduction of batteries
and power electronics. With
advances in power electronics, EV
charging technologies, both wired
and wireless power transfer (WPT),
have also evolved over the years.
This cover article explores developments
in EV charging technologies,
as the industry works to expedite
the charging speed of the battery
to compete with the short time it
Digital Object Identifier 10.1109/MPEL.2022.3172573
Date of current version: 16 June 2022
takes to fill the tank of conventional
vehicles. In the wired arena, the article
investigates improvements in
on-board and off-board chargers, as
well as fast and extreme fast chargers
with power ratings.
Likewise, in the wireless section, it
summarizes the state-of-the-art WPT
systems for EV charger applications,
and investigates interest in integrating
charger with other on-board systems
to save the cost and size. Lastly, with
power demand increasing for EVs, it
projects 800 V battery will become the
mainstream in the near future.
The next feature " Practical Realization
of GaN's Capability: GaNFast
Power ICs Introduce Lossless
Sensing and Autonomous Protections. "
The authors John Stevens,
Tom Ribarich, and Stephen Oliver
jointly examine the short-circuit
protection and cycle-by-cycle current
limit in the lossless current sensing
of GaNFast IC with integrated GaNSense
technology.
It demonstrates
the added benefit of local protection
at the power switch with improved
accuracy and drastically reduced response
time to an overload current
event. Plus, it displays the thermal benefits
of efficiency improvements with
lossless current sensing.
Similarly, in the third feature " Transformative
Role of Power Electronics
in Solving Climate Emergency " by
Rajendra Singh, Prahaladh Paniyil,
and Zheyu Zhang, the authors show
that power electronics has the poten4
IEEE POWER ELECTRONICS MAGAZINE z June 2022
tial to achieve the goal of electrifying
almost everything by green sustainable
electric power and provide a cost effective
solution to our shared climate
emergency. The article argues that a
large amount of green electric dc power
generated by photovoltaics and/or
wind turbines and stored in batteries
is wasted in current ac electricity infrastructure.
Based on silicon carbide
power electronics, it proposes HVDC
transmission of bulk power by dc-dc
power converters. In conclusion, the
authors say " power electronics with
higher performance, higher reliability,
and low-cost power has the potential
to provide transformative transformation
of power transmission, distribution,
and utilization. "
Microgrids is the focus of the next
feature titled " Microgrids in a Smart
Low-Voltage Distribution System. " In
this article, authors Ramanuja Panigrahi,
Santanu Mishra, S C Srivastava,
Prasad Enjeti propose converting
a smart low-voltage distribution
system (LVDS) following a distribution
transformer into a three-phase
ac microgrid. Thus, segregating the
existing LVDS into a smart LVDS with
as many microgrids as the number
of distribution transformers. Furthermore,
it proposes replacing the
low-voltage distribution transformers
with solid-state transformers (SSTs)
to enable the LVDS to control the power
exchange between the phases within
a microgrid as well as power exchange
between different microgrids.
IEEE Power Electronics Magazine - June 2022

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