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At least 181 records · Page 10

All sources NASA NTRS DOE OSTI

DOE OSTI2020

Design of Auxiliary Circuit Elements for Achieving Zero Voltage Switching in a Wireless Power Transfer System

The auxiliary resonant commutated pole (ARCP) is being used to achieve zero voltage switching (ZVS) of power switches for improved efficiency and/or to reduce dv/dt at the switch node for better electromagnetic interference (EMI) performance and overall system reliability. This paper shows how an ARCP circuit can be used in a wireless power transfer system to achieve ZVS. Detailed analysis of ARCP circuit operation is presented to determine the requirements for achieving ZVS in the main switches of a wireless electric vehicle charging system. Based on this analysis, a design algorithm is developed to optimize the design of the ZVS assisting circuit components. The designed ARCP achieves soft switching of the MOSFETs in the primary inverter of an 85 kHz, 10 kW series-series compensated, stationary wireless power transfer system.

Saha, Tarak↗

DOE OSTI2026

Supervised Learning-Based Spatial Position Estimation with Vertical Displacement for Hovering UAV Wireless Power Transfer

This study presents a supervised learning-based spatial position estimation approach for wireless power transfer (WPT) systems supporting hovering unmanned aerial vehicle (UAV) charging. Unlike stationary charging scenarios, hovering UAVs introduce continuous lateral misalignment and vertical displacement, leading to variations in magnetic coupling and reduced power transfer efficiency. To address this challenge, the proposed method estimates the relative spatial position of the receiver coil using only electrical measurements obtained at the secondary side. A supervised learning model is trained to map output voltage and current features to spatial coordinates, enabling position awareness without requiring external sensors, vision systems, or communication links. The sensing functionality is inherently integrated into the WPT system, allowing simultaneous power transfer and localization through the same magnetic interface. Experimental validation is conducted on a laboratory-scale prototype under varying lateral offsets and air-gap conditions. In addition, spline-based interpolation is employed to increase spatial data density for training. The results demonstrate that the proposed framework can capture spatial variations associated with both lateral and vertical displacement, providing reliable position estimation under hovering conditions. This work establishes a hardware-efficient, sensorless solution for UAV wireless charging and serves as a baseline for advanced data-driven position estimation methods in dynamic WPT systems.

Asa, Erdem [ORNL] (ORCID:0000000190884812)↗

DOE OSTI2019

Challenges of future high power wireless power transfer for light-duty electric vehicles----technology and risk management

Wireless power transfer is a state-of-the-art technology with the advantage of convenience and flexibility, as well as the capability of enabling fully automated charging. With power transfer levels increasing beyond 100 kW, many technical and risk management challenges emerge. Here, instead of focusing on the progress review of wireless power transfer technology, this paper discusses the future challenges and risks for high power wireless charging for light-duty electric vehicles. Aiming at 200 kW or higher wireless power transfer, we discuss technology and risk management challenges in the area of electromagnetic safety, resonant frequency determination, and cybersecurity risks in detail. As potential solutions to overcome these challenges, the latest technologies with an emphasis on advanced shielding solutions and recent progress on SiC converters from both industrial and academic institutions are reviewed, and some perspectives and propositions are provided.

25 ENERGY STORAGE↗

DOE OSTI2018

Two-Layer Predictive Controller for V2G and G2V Services Using on Wireless Power Transfer Technology

This paper presents a comprehensive solution that allows electric vehicles (EV) to autonomously charge and discharge their batteries wirelessly during long term parking and/or the transient stops. A two-layer power-flow controller for bidirectional wireless power transfer system (BWPTS) in EVs applications is proposed. The proposed controller can manage the bidirectional power-flow between EV and surrounding infrastructures such as power grid, home microgrid, building micro-grid, road or another vehicle. It consists of two levels of control; the first is responsible for communicating with the surrounding infrastructures and gathering information from driver, charging station, power grid and battery management system and then, based on these information, it estimates the EV's psychological price as a function of its battery's state-of-charge (SOC) and compares it with the energy price to decide whether to charge, discharge or abstain, and how much the charging or discharging rate. The second layer receives the reference signal from the first one and generates the control parameters for two synchronized resonant converters (one is on the vehicle side and the other is on the grid side) to provide the requited power-flow. The proposed controller is adaptively estimating the system parameters to consider the misalignment conditions effects on the system performance. The parameter estimation is achieved using only one voltage sensor. The second layer control is designed based on a new analytical modeling for the power flow in the system. For verification purposes, a prototype for BWPTS was built and driven by the proposed controller, which was implemented using a field-programmable gate array (FPGA) integrated circuit. The proposed controller provides very fast and stable response during both the transient and steady state operation in comparison with the conventional PI controller.

33 ADVANCED PROPULSION SYSTEMS↗

DOE OSTI2021

DESIGN & DEVELOPMENT OF A SECURE SELF-LEVELING WIRELESS RECHARGING PLATFORM FOR AN AERIAL DRONE ON AN UNMANNED SURFACE VESSEL

The Design and Development of an automated recharging station for an aerial drone, onboard a small, unmanned surface vessel, is described. Drones require a landing surface that is level within five degrees of the surrounding terrain for repeated reliable landing and takeoff. System constraints and at-sea application necessitate a compact, lightweight, and secure solution. A passive self-leveling platform and an accompanying automated parallel-pusher drone restraint mechanism have been designed and fabricated to aid in achieving a level landing surface and holding the drone in place while it charges. The self-leveling mechanism has been analyzed and subjected to initial laboratory tests. The testing of the drone restraint mechanism to verify its weight capacity and closing time, and the integration of the platform with a custom conductive contact wireless charging pad are identified as future work. The resulting cohesive unit will be tested for performance optimization and implementation onboard the unmanned surface vehicle.

McKinney, Adriana↗

DOE OSTI2025

Dynamic Capacitive Wireless Power Transfer System for Electric Vehicles (CRADA Final Report)

Road transportation accounts for 23% of our nation's total energy consumption, 59% of our petroleum consumption and 22% of our total emissions. Electric vehicles (EVs) have much higher well-to-wheel efficiency compared to gasoline vehicles and can reduce our dependence on oil, minimize emissions, improve local air quality and provide a platform for technological innovation and economic growth. While major progress has been made in the development of electric vehicles, their penetration remains under 1 The main hurdles in their widespread adoption are high cost, limited range and long charging times, due to limitations in battery technology. An approach to overcome these hurdles is to substantially reduce the on-board energy storage and instead deliver power wirelessly to the vehicle while it is in motion dynamic wireless power transfer (WPT). For EV charging applications, researchers have traditionally focused on inductive WPT. An issue with inductive WPT systems is that for magnetic flux guidance and shielding, they require ferrite cores, making them expensive, bulky and difficult to embed in the roadway. Under an ARPA-E IDEAS grant, the CU Boulder team has recently developed an alternative approach to WPT based on capacitive coupling that is much smaller, lighter, less expensive, and easier to embed in the roadway than inductive WPT; and have demonstrated a 1.2-kW 6.78-MHz version of this capacitive WPT system on a stationary platform. Under this seed grant program, preliminary work will be carried out on a dynamic capacitive WPT system to prepare a strong proposal for the ARPA-E OPEN 2018 FOA.

33 ADVANCED PROPULSION SYSTEMS↗

DOE OSTI2013

Wireless Power Transfer

Wireless Power Transfer is an innovative approach using magnetic resonance coupling of air core transformers designed for today's growing plug-in electric vehicle market. This technology can provide a convenient, safe and flexible means to charge electric vehicles under stationary and dynamic conditions. Plug-in Electric Vehicles (PEV) are burdened by the need for cable and plug charger, galvanic isolation of the on-board electronics, bulk and cost of this charger and the large energy storage system (ESS) packs needed. With a system where you have to physically plug in there are a number of occasions where the owner could very well forget to charge the vehicle. For stationary applications (like charging of a PHEV at home), ORNL's innovative wireless power transfer technology adds a convenience factor compared to actually plugging in which will mean that the vehicle will have a full charge every morning. Electric vehicle charging must be safe, compact and efficient in order to be convenient for customers. By reconfiguring the transformer and altering the resonance frequency, energy is transferred to the battery with lower energy losses and with fewer demands on the primary circuit by the rest of the transformer system. The ORNL discovery shows that sufficient power for the battery can be transferred from the primary to secondary circuits without significant energy losses if the operating frequency is set at 50% to 95% of the resonance frequency of the circuit. The electrical power is then transmitted to the chargeable battery, which is electrically coupled to the secondary circuit through the air core transformer. Some advantages include: Reduced energy losses during transfer of energy to the battery; A charge potential that is relatively unaffected by up to 25% misalignment of vehicle; and Other receiving components draw less power from the primary circuit. These advantages allow wireless power technology applications to expand at the workplace and beyond as the demand for EV rises. For vehicles that operate over a fixed route such as busses and shuttle vehicles, Wireless Power Transfer (WPT) means that a smaller battery pack can be used. In the traditional system, the battery pack is designed to accommodate the needs of the entire route or shift. With WPT the battery can be downsized because it can be charged when the vehicle stops on its route (a rental car shuttle bus, for example, can charge when it waits in the terminal and again when it waits at the rental car place. Thus the battery only needs enough charge to get to the next stop. This decrease in battery size means significant cost savings to electrify the vehicle. This technology enables efficient "opportunity charging stations" for predefined routes and planned stops reducing down time. Charging can occur in minutes. This improvement also eliminates the harmful emissions that occur in garages while buses are at idle during charging. In larger cities, dynamic charging offers an even greater impact utilizing existing infrastructure. As vehicles travel along busy freeways and interstate systems, wireless charging can occur while the vehicle is in motion. With this technology a vehicle essentially has unlimited electric range while using a relatively small battery pack. In-motion charging stations use vehicle sensors to alert the driver. Traveling at normal speeds, sensors establish in-motion charging. WPT transmit pads sequentially energize to the negotiated power level based on vehicle speed and its requested charging energy. Lower power when vehicle speed is slow and much higher power for faster moving vehicles. Vehicle to Infrastructure communications (V2I) coordinates WPT charging level according to on-board battery pack state-of-charge. V2I activates the roadway transmit pads placing them in standby mode and negotiates charging fee based on prevailing grid rate and vehicle energy demand. Dynamic charging would allow electricity to supply a very large fraction of the energy for the transportation sector and reduce greatly petroleum consumption. Previously worrisome traffic delays now provide longer periods of charge while passing over in-motion chargers. Inclement weather such as rain and snow do not affect the charging capability. At ORNL, we are working to develop the robust nature of wireless power technology to provide a convenient, safe and flexible means to charge electric vehicles under stationary and dynamic conditions.

33 ADVANCED PROPULSION SYSTEMS↗

DOE OSTI2014

SiC MOSFET Based Single Phase Active Boost Rectifier with Power Factor Correction for Wireless Power Transfer Applications

Wireless Power Transfer (WPT) technology is a novel research area in the charging technology that bridges the utility and the automotive industries. There are various solutions that are currently being evaluated by several research teams to find the most efficient way to manage the power flow from the grid to the vehicle energy storage system. There are different control parameters that can be utilized to compensate for the change in the impedance due to variable parameters such as battery state-of-charge, coupling factor, and coil misalignment. This paper presents the implementation of an active front-end rectifier on the grid side for power factor control and voltage boost capability for load power regulation. The proposed SiC MOSFET based single phase active front end rectifier with PFC resulted in >97% efficiency at 137mm air-gap and >95% efficiency at 160mm air-gap.

active rectifier↗

DOE OSTI2015

Regulation control and energy management scheme for wireless power transfer

Power transfer rate at a charging facility can be maximized by employing a feedback scheme. The state of charge (SOC) and temperature of the regenerative energy storage system (RESS) pack of a vehicle is monitored to determine the load due to the RESS pack. An optimal frequency that cancels the imaginary component of the input impedance for the output signal from a grid converter is calculated from the load of the RESS pack, and a frequency offset f* is made to the nominal frequency f.sub.0 of the grid converter output based on the resonance frequency of a magnetically coupled circuit. The optimal frequency can maximize the efficiency of the power transfer. Further, an optimal grid converter duty ratio d* can be derived from the charge rate of the RESS pack. The grid converter duty ratio d* regulates wireless power transfer (WPT) power level.

24 POWER TRANSMISSION AND DISTRIBUTION↗

DOE OSTI2024

Sustainability of Dynamic Wireless Power Transfer Roadway for In-Motion Electric Vehicle Charging

Not provided.

Engineering↗

DOE OSTI2019

Potential Cybersecurity Issues of Fast Charging Stations with Quantitative Severity Analysis

Potential issues of front-end converters of wireless power transfer system modules for extreme fast charging are discussed and analyzed in this study in order to provide some recommendations to defend against attacks on electric vehicles and charging systems. Compared to conventional low-power charging systems, the impact of a cyber-attack might be more detrimental in high-power / fast charging systems since the fault energy levels would be inherently higher both on the grid- and vehicle- side converters. In order to analyze the potential issues that might be a result of cyber-attacks, the negative scenarios are reviewed in this study which include interfering with the grid-side controllers, establishing fake communications between the vehicles and the charging stations, and interfering with the battery management system functionalities. A 100-kW stationary wireless power transfer system with a series-series resonant compensation network is used as a representative system in the analysis. Potential damages and the fault energy levels for selected fault scenarios are investigated. The system is simulated to verify the analysis results. On the basis of the discussed worst-case study, a set of hardware design-level solutions are recommended in this study to provide cyber protection.

Park, Yongwan↗

DOE OSTI2025

Stability Analysis of Parallel Connected Bidirectional WPT System

This paper presents a stability analysis of parallel-connected bi-directional series-series resonant network wireless power transfer (WPT), optimized for Electric Vehicle (EV) charging and vehicle-to-grid (V2G) applications. The study addresses critical stability challenges in systems integrated with diverse distributed energy resources (DERs), including photovoltaics, fuel cells, wind turbines, energy storage systems, and the AC grid. The stability of such integrated DC grid systems is paramount for ensuring reliable operation, particularly under varying power flow conditions and dynamic interactions between parallel WPT systems. The analysis included system impedance characterization, state-space modeling, and open and closed-loop stability evaluations. The results demonstrated that the integration of a robust control architecture effectively mitigates instability risks and supports scalable, efficient operation. This work underscores the converter's adaptability and its potential for large-scale deployment in wireless EV charging infrastructures and integrated DC grid systems.

Asa, Erdem [ORNL] (ORCID:0000000190884812)↗

DOE OSTI2016

Analyzing Potential Grid Impacts from Future In-Motion Roadway Wireless Power Transfer Scenarios: Preprint

This work examines the grid impact of in-motion roadway wireless power transfer through the examination of the electrification of high-capacity roadways inside a metropolitan area. The work uses data from a regional travel study and the Federal Highway Administration's Highway Performance Monitoring System to estimate the electrified roadway's hourly power use throughout a week. The data are then combined with hourly grid load estimates for the same metropolitan area to determine the overlay of traditional grid load with additional load from a future electrified roadway.

30 DIRECT ENERGY CONVERSION↗

DOE OSTI2017

Analyzing Potential Grid Impacts from Future In-Motion Roadway Wireless Power Transfer Scenarios

30 DIRECT ENERGY CONVERSION↗

DOE OSTI2015

A New Vehicle-to-Grid System for Battery Charging exploiting IoT protocols

The continuously rising demand for electricity has prompted governments and industries to research more effective energy management systems. The Internet of Things paradigm is a valuable add-on for controlling and managing the energy appliances such as Plug-in Electrical Vehicles (PEV) charging stations. In this paper, we present a Demand Response implementation for PEV charging stations able to use Wireless Sensor Network technologies based on the Constrained Application Protocol (CoAP). We developed a self-service kiosk system by which the user can autonomously swipe his/her credit card and choose the charging station to enable. When a user plugs his/her vehicle to the station, s/he subscribes his availability to share a portion of its energy. When the grid requests a contribution from the PEVs, the kiosk sends a CoAP message to the available stations and the energy flow is inverted (Vehicle-to-Grid). At the end of the charging process, the user's credit card gets charged with a discounted bill.

Fachechi, Alessio↗

DOE OSTI2023

A Novel Honeycomb-DD Multi Coil Design for Wireless Power Transfer Systems

Wireless power transfer (WPT) technology has received significant attention recently as an alternative charging method for batteries in a wide range of power levels. In the literature, many types of coil structures have been well-studied. Honeycomb coil arrays, which have been used mostly for low-power applications, have not been well-studied for high-power-level applications. In this paper, a novel honeycomb-DD coil design is proposed for high-power wireless battery charging systems. The proposed coil design with step by step design process is given and Finite Element Analysis (FEA) was performed to observe the full performance characteristics of the system for a 100 kW system. In addition, the misalignment tolerance of the proposed system was observed by shifting the secondary side charging pad at different misalignment positions, and the electromagnetic compatibility to the standards was investigated. The core and strand losses were obtained. The results show that the honeycomb coil array provides high coupling coefficient and better misalignment tolerance, making it a potential coil topology for WPT applications.

Aydin, Emrullah↗

DOE OSTI2014

A SiC MOSFET Based Inverter for Wireless Power Transfer Applications

In a wireless power transfer (WPT) system, efficiency of the power conversion stages is crucial so that the WPT technology can compete with the conventional conductive charging systems. Since there are 5 or 6 power conversion stages, each stage needs to be as efficient as possible. SiC inverters are crucial in this case; they can handle high frequency operation and they can operate at relatively higher temperatures resulting in reduces cost and size for the cooling components. This study presents the detailed power module design, development, and fabrication of a SiC inverter. The proposed inverter has been tested at three center frequencies that are considered for the WPT standardization. Performance of the inverter at the same target power transfer level is analyzed along with the other system components. In addition, another SiC inverter has been built in authors laboratory by using the ORNL designed and developed SiC modules. It is shown that the inverter with ORNL packaged SiC modules performs simular to that of the inverter having commercially available SiC modules.

electromagnetic resonance induction coupling↗

DOE OSTI2026

Wireless Bioelectronic Modulation of Membrane Potential in Glioblastoma Using Carbon Nanotube Porins

Disruption of membrane potential (V mem ) can activate pathways associated with cancer proliferation. Manipulating ion channels may therefore present an effective strategy for treating cancers that fail to respond to conventional therapies. One approach to target these channels is to manipulate the membrane charge, which involves the use of wireless bipolar electrodes such as carbon nanotube porins (CNTPs) inserted into cell membranes to modulate membrane charge and ionic flux. By utilizing membrane dyes, we observed alterations in V mem induced by CNTPs and externally applied voltages. Analyses of cellular behaviors and processes indicated that V mem is more receptive to stimuli in invasive cancers, while it leads to increased metabolism in less invasive cancers, with notable changes in the cell cycle occurring at approximately 48 h post-treatment in Glioblastoma (GB) cell lines. This work shows that CNTPs, in combination and with externally applied voltages, can modulate V mem and alter cancer cell processes, supporting their potential as a therapeutic.

bioelectricity↗