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A Modern DSP-based Laboratory for Power Electronics Education

Abstract

Power Electronics is an important emerging technology and has become an integral part of power engineering education. This paper addresses the critical challenge of educating the future Electric Power Engineers in this rapidly developing multidisciplinary field. Special emphasis is placed on design aspects of power electronics by incorporating pre-Labs involving PSpice simulation. This allows the students to have a good understanding of the circuit design and operation before they get the hands on experience from the actual hardware experiments. This paper will disseminate the results of the newly developed laboratory experiments that have been implemented so far, along with the initial assessment data gathered by an independent evaluator.

1. Introduction

Power Electronics deals with the application of solid state electronics for the control, conditioning, and conversion of electric power. Raw Power (120 V, 60 Hz AC) supplied by the utility in many cases need to be conditioned, controlled or converted for the following reasons: achieve energy efficiency; to improve reliability; to match different load requirements (eg. DC, high frequency AC, variable voltage variable frequency AC). Power Electronics is an interdisciplinary field including power systems, solid state electronics, machines, analog/digital control, signal processing etc. It is predicted that within the next 10 years 80% of the total power consumed will be processed by some form of power electronics between its generation and use []. This paper addresses the critical challenge of educating the future Electric Power Engineers in this rapidly developing multidisciplinary field.

The Department of Engineering Technology at University of Houston (UH) is one of the few universities in the nation that has a well reputed program in Electric Power Engineering Technology. The Electric Power Program at UH caters to the large base of electrical equipment manufacturing companies in the Houston area as well as electrical utilities and independent power providers throughout Texas. Recent years show widespread use of Power Electronics in power system applications alongside applications in robotics and automated factories, space and defense applications, electric vehicles etc. Hence, there is a need for state-of-the-art education in the emerging and important area of Power Electronics. A senior level course in Power Electronics (ELET 4326-Power Converter Circuits) was added to the degree plan recently. Power Electronics is an applied discipline and a well-planned hardware laboratory should be an integral part of its education plan. A laboratory component for the above course was developed by the author under a NSF-CCLI grant. The focus of this project was to develop a modern hardware laboratory that will be tightly coupled with the senior level course in Power Electronics. The proposed Laboratory provides the opportunity to Electric Power Engineering Technology graduates to have hands-on knowledge and experience in this rapidly developing field. The Power Electronics course developed by the PI and the proposed Laboratory will be a

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Shireen, W., & McNeil, S. (2008, June), A Modern Dsp Based Laboratory For Power Electronics Education Paper presented at 2008 Annual Conference & Exposition, Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania. 10.18260/1-2--3741