Recently, the thermal management of power electronic converters has gained significant attention due to the continuous trend of developing very compact power electronic converters with high power density. With the evolution of power semiconductor devices, high operating temperatures and large thermal cycles have become possible, necessitating a significant improvement in thermal system designs. Researchers have made significant efforts to develop effective thermal management systems to improve the reliability and lifetime of power electronic converters. This article intends to present a thorough review of thermal management systems employed in power electronics cooling. The applied thermal management techniques have been reviewed from the perspective of electrical parameter regulation and heat dissipation control. Regulation of electrical parameters involves active thermal control, which is a method for controlling junction temperature and thermal cycling of power semiconductor devices. The active thermal control implementation processes reviewed in this article consist of increasing overload capacity, manipulating switching and conduction losses, employing modified modulation processes, balancing thermal stress at the converter level, and controlling thermal stress at the system level. Control of heat dissipation can be achieved through direct and indirect cooling of power electronic converters with air or liquid as the coolant. The effectiveness and implementation methods of these cooling techniques, such as channel cooling, phase change material-based cooling, immersion cooling, jet impingement and spray cooling, are reviewed in this paper. Moreover, performance-enhancing ideas and challenges for these techniques are discussed. The primary objective of this review paper is to bridge the existing gap in the literature by offering a comprehensive comparison of commonly employed thermal management techniques.

Power quality is a pressing concern and of the utmost importance for advanced and high-tech equipment in particular, whose performance relies heavily on the supply’s quality. Power quality issues like voltage sags/swells, harmonics, interruptions, etc. are defined as any deviations in current, voltage, or frequency that result in end-use equipment damage or failure. Sensitive loads like medical equipment in hospitals and health clinics, schools, prisons, etc. malfunction for the outages and interruptions, thereby causing substantial economic losses. For enhancing power quality, custom power devices (CPDs) are recommended, among which the Dynamic Voltage Restorer (DVR) is considered as the best and cost-effective solution. DVR is a power electronic-based solution to mitigate and compensate voltage sags. This paper provides a thorough discussion and comprehensive review of DVR topologies based on operations, power converters, control methods, and applications. The review compares the state-of-the-art in works of literature, and comparative study on power quality issues, the DVR principle along with its operation modes, the DVR components, the DVR topologies based on energy storage, the DVR topologies based on single-/three-phase power converters, and the DVR topologies based on control units that have different control processing stages. Furthermore, modified and improved configurations of the DVR, as well as its integration with distributed generations, are described. This work serves as a comprehensive and useful reference for those who have an interest in researching DVRs.

In this article, a new solar PV fed Dynamic Voltage Restorer (DVR) based on Trans-Z-source Inverter (TransZSI) is proposed to improve the power quality of on-grid Photovoltaic (PV) systems. DVR is a power electronic compensator using for injecting the desired voltage to the Point of Common Coupling (PCC) as per the voltage disturbance. In the proposed DVR, in place of traditional VSI, TransZSI with outstanding merits of buck/boost, a broader range of voltage boost gain, fewer passive components, and lower voltage stress, is put forth. For efficient detection, accurate voltage disturbances mitigation, and also lessening the injected voltage harmonics, a hybrid Unit Vector Template with Maximum Constant Boost Control (UVT-MCBC) method is proposed for TransZSI-DVR. The performance of the proposed TransZSI-DVR with UVT-MCBC has been analyzed under severe sag, slight sag with harmonics, swell, and interruption. The comparative studies and simulation results have shown the effectiveness of the proposed TransZSI-DVR, as opposed to traditional ZSI-DVR and VSI-DVR. The TransZSI-DVR in the PV system has mitigated voltage sag/swell/interruption. It has also improved the power quality of both the injected voltage to the PCC and PV system’s output voltage.

Global warming and the desire to increase the use of clean energy have led to increasing the installation and operation of renewable energy power plants (REPPs), especially large-scale photovoltaic (PV) farms (LPFs). Given that the LPFs are added to power system or replace conventional power plants, they must be able to perform the basic tasks of synchronous generators (SGs). One of these tasks is the ability to mitigate the low-frequency oscillation (LFO) risk. Also, one of the LPFs problems is reducing the power system inertia and increasing the risk of LFOs. Therefore, these types of power plants must damp the LFOs through a power oscillation damping controller (PODC), similar to the performance of power system stabilizers (PSSs) in the SGs. This paper represents an overview of the different PODCs and control methods for LFOs damping by LPF. It seems that it can be a driver for future studies. Different studies show that the application of PODCs for LPFs can play an effective role to damp the LFOs and increase the power system stability.

Power converters have widespread applications in automotive, renewables, and power systems. The demand for power modules with low power consumption and high efficiency has increased due to advancements in semiconductor devices. So, power converters need to be highly efficient to reduce costs associated with energy dissipation and cooling requirements. This paper discusses various active thermal control methods for high-power power converters. It covers modulation and configuration techniques, ranging from single configurations to cascaded, modular, and multilevel converters. These concepts form the basis of power electronics building blocks, particularly relevant in all-electric ship systems. Power electronics building blocks represent a thriving technology that will advance ship power systems, the thermal design of which plays a crucial role in managing high heat dissipation levels. Hence, thermal management is essential for reliable device performance. The paper thoroughly studies different active thermal control methods and their impact on power semiconductor devices and converters, categorized per configurations, power routing methods, modulation, and control layers. The review then moves to thermal control methods for the PEBBs concept using multilevel converters in all-electric ship systems and outlines future research directions for the thermal aspect of power electronics building blocks.