Demonstration of a 600-V, 60-A, bidirectional silicon carbide solid-state circuit breaker

Bidirectional solid-state circuit breakers (BDSSCBs) can replace mechanical fault protection devices in systems having bidirectional current flow through a single bus, for increased transition speed, functionality, and reliability. Silicon carbide, 1200-V, 0.1-cm² JFETs were designed and fabricated for the BDSSCB application. A novel BDSSCB gate driver was developed for both self-triggered temperature-compensated over-current protection, and external triggering. Bidirectional 600-V, 60-A fault isolation was demonstrated in a transition time of approximately 10 μs with two packaged JFET modules, a bidirectional RCD snubber, and a series distribution bus inductance of 20 μH.