A Low-Loss Gate Drive for Emitter Turn-Off Thyristor (ETO)

This letter introduces a new and energy-efficient gate drive circuit for emitter turn-off thyristor (ETO). The proposed circuit is a buck converter with two controllers that obtains power from gate current when the ETO gate voltage is negative, thus reducing power dissipation of the ETO gate drive and significantly mitigating a limitation of current ETO self-power designs. Various on-state gate current circuits are discussed and simulated. Experimental results verify the proposed circuit´s operation and low-power consumption performance. The proposed circuit can be used in integrated gate-commutated thyristor and gate-commutated thyristor as well.