Development of high power density three-phase solar string inverter

采用三相串联逆变器将太阳能转化为电网电能或通用交流电是当今商业和公用事业规模太阳能发电厂的一个新的市场趋势。目前，现有的这种规模的光伏(PV)逆变器太大太重，一个人无法操作，这给这种系统的安装和维护带来了巨大的工作量和成本。在这个项目中，我们将开发一种基于正在申请专利的多电平转换器拓扑结构的高功率密度光伏串逆变器，该拓扑结构使用硅和下一代氮化镓(GaN)器件的组合。该逆变器具有可靠性高、成本低、体积小、重量轻等特点。该项目以实验室规模的50kW样机的成功测试为基础，旨在开发运行在100kW的商业级样机。*

There is a new market trend in commercial and utility scale solar power plants today to adopt more three-phase string power inverters to convert solar energy into grid power or general-purpose alternating current (AC) electricity. Currently, existing photovoltaic (PV) inverters of such scale are too large and heavy for one man to handle, imposing significant efforts and cost for the installation and maintenance of such a system. In this project, we will develop a high power density PV string inverter based on a patent pending multilevel converter topology which uses a combination of silicon and next generation Gallium Nitride (GaN) devices. The inverter features high reliability, low cost, compact size and low weight. The project is based on the successful testing of a lab scale 50kW size prototype and aims to develop a commercial level prototype which will operate at 100kW.****