SIC-Based Three-Phase Current Source Inverters – A Survey

SiC-based diodes and transistors, offering significantly better performance than those in silicon technology in many aspects essential for power electronics, are already having a very large impact on applications in various fields. It is unanimously accepted that they will replace in the field of high voltages and powers the Si semiconductor devices, which have reached their technological limits and can no longer be used in the future for the continuous improvement of power static converters performances. This article is a review of the use of switching semiconductor devices based on SiC technology in current source inverters (CSI). The specific advantages of SiC technology for these types of converters, the main applications of CSI in which SiC diodes and transistors have already been used and some research directions of interest for the near future are presented.