Real-Time IGBT Module Ageing Characterization Through Temperature Monitoring

This paper introduces a novel method for monitoring the ageing of Si insulated-gate bipolar transistors (IGBT) in real-time based on component temperature measurements. The method consists of simulating power losses and the thermal behaviour models of an IGBT module in different predefined ageing states. These simulations determine the values of expected thermal indicators for contemplated ageing conditions and establish a correlation with the IGBT module ageing state expressed on conventional indicators, such as collector-emitter on-state voltage (V<inf xmlns:mml="http://www.w3.org/1998/Math/MathML" xmlns:xlink="http://www.w3.org/1999/xlink">CE-ON</inf>) and junction-to-case thermal resistance (R<inf xmlns:mml="http://www.w3.org/1998/Math/MathML" xmlns:xlink="http://www.w3.org/1999/xlink">TH-JC</inf>). This innovative method allows the simultaneous monitoring of several ageing mechanisms and opens the door for studying their dynamics during the process. To assess the potential of this method, this manuscript presents a validation of the methodology in a virtual environment, accompanied by experimental results, making a significant advancement in the field of IGBT ageing monitoring.