Review of Recent Trends in Design of Traction Inverters for Electric Vehicle Applications

A surge in usage of electric vehicles in transportation sector over the past decade is overwhelming. Recent trends in the design of traction inverters employed in commercially available electric vehicle (EV) traction applications have been reviewed in this paper. A trend in design matrices namely Volumetric Power Density (VPD) in kW/L and Gravimetric Power Density (GPD) in kW/kg of different traction inverters have been presented. A standard topology of the traction inverter and control methodology employed in EV applications have been reviewed. The selection of the components to meet the targets of design matrices set by the United States, Department of Energy (DoE) has been discussed. Thus, the paper provides a useful reference for original equipment manufacturers.