Development of High-Performance GRIP Metal Cold Plates for IGBT Cooling

绝缘栅双极晶体管(IGBT)提高了电动汽车(EV)的能效和电池续航能力，其市场正在迅速扩大。大功率IGBT在运行过程中会产生大量热量，必须进行充分冷却，以确保良好的电气性能和可靠性。这通常是通过将IGBT安装到“冷板”上来实现的，液体冷却液(通常是水-乙二醇)通过冷板循环。这项技术面临着一个挑战：在保持低压降的同时，这些冷板内的换热应该最大化。NUCAP开发了一种新的表面强化技术，可以显著增强对流换热。现在有机会将这些表面增强技术应用到具有卓越热工水力性能的新型GRIPMetals(一种将金属钩分布在金属表面的专利技术)IGBT冷板中。这有可能产生一种低调和轻量化的技术，使其成为对不断增长的电动汽车和可再生能源行业具有吸引力的商业产品。该项目的目标是通过对该技术进行热工水力设计、优化以及全面的性能表征和验证，支持Nucap开发GRIPMetals IGBT冷板。这将通过实验表征、数值模拟和可靠性测试相结合来实现。结果将包括对GRIPMetal冷板性能的准确量化，以及与现有商业产品的比较。该项目还将生产GRIPMetal冷板的热工水力模型和冷板专用设计工具，这将使Nucap能够为进一步的应用设计和优化其他尺寸的冷板。

Insulated-gate bipolar transistors (IGBTs) improve the energy efficiency and battery range for electrical vehicles (EVs) and the market for them is rapidly expanding. High-power IGBTs generate a significant amount of heat during operation and must be adequately cooled to ensure good electrical performance and reliability. This is typically accomplished by mounting the IGBTs to "cold plates" through which a liquid cooling fluid (typically water-glycol) is circulated. This technology faces a challenge: heat transfer within these cold plates should be maximized while maintaining a low pressure drop.NUCAP has developed a novel surface enhancement which significantly increases convective heat transfer. There is an opportunity implement these surface enhancements into a new class of GRIPMetal (a patented technology where metal hooks are distributed on metal surfaces) IGBT cold plates which have superior thermal-hydraulic performance. This has the potential to yield a technology that is low-profile and lightweight making it an attractive commercial offering for the growing EV and renewable energy sectors.The objective of this project is to support NUCAP in their development of GRIPMetal IGBT cold plates by performing the thermal-hydraulic design, optimization, and full performance characterization and validation of this technology. This will be accomplished through a combination of experimental characterization, numerical modelling, and reliability testing. The outcomes will include accurate quantification of GRIPMetal cold plate performance and comparisons to existing commercially available offerings. The project will also yield thermal-hydraulic models for GRIPMetal cold plates and cold-plate specific design tools which will allow NUCAP to design and optimize other sizes of cold plates for further applications.