Advantages of High Frequency PWM in AC Motor

Drive Applications
Kohei Shirabe, Mahesh Swamy, Jun-Koo Kang, and
Masaki Hisatsune

Yifeng Wu, Don Kebort, and Jim Honea

Transphorm Inc.
75 Castilian Drive
Goleta, CA 93317, USA

Yaskawa America Inc.

Waukegan, IL 60085, USA
Abstract There are many advantages of using high frequency
PWM (in the range of 50 to 100 kHz) in motor drive applications.
High motor efficiency, fast control response, lower motor torque
ripple, close to ideal sinusoidal motor current waveform, smaller
filter size, lower cost filter, etc. are a few of the advantages.
However, higher frequency PWM is also associated with severe
voltage reflection and motor insulation breakdown issues at the
motor terminals. If standard Si IGBT based inverters are
employed, losses in the switches make it difficult to overcome
significant drop in efficiency of converting electrical power to
mechanical power. Work on SiC and GaN based inverter has
progressed and variable frequency drives (VFDs) can now be
operated efficiently at carrier frequencies in the 50 to 200 kHz
range, using these devices. Using soft magnetic material, the
overall efficiency of filtering can be improved. The switching
characteristics of SiC and GaN devices are such that even at high
switching frequency, the turn on and turn off losses are minimal.
Hence, there is not much penalty in increasing the carrier
frequency of the VFD. Losses in AC motors due to PWM
waveform are significantly reduced. All the above features put
together improves system efficiency. This paper presents results
obtained on using a 6-in-1 GaN module for VFD application,
operating at a carrier frequency of 100 kHz with an output sine
wave filter. Experimental results show the improvement in
motor efficiency and system efficiency on using a GaN based
VFD in comparison to the standard Si IGBT based VFD.

I.

issues.

Efficiency of converting electrical input power to

mechanical output power also suffers due to losses associated

with PWM waveforms. There are many published studies that
document these influences [1-5].
To reduce the loss in AC motors due to PWM waveform,
traditionally output sine

wave

filters are

employed.

Unfortunately, using a sine wave filter in many cases shifts

some of the loss associated with PWM from the motor to the
sine wave filter. In addition, the size and cost of the sine wave
filter cannot be ignored, especially in large power applications,
where the PWM carrier frequency cannot be increased to high
values due to the power loss constraints imposed by Si IGBTs
at those power levels.
Using the latest high frequency SiC or GaN power
switches, it is now possible to operate efficiently a VFD with
high PWM carrier frequency. Higher PWM carrier frequency
allows the design of sine wave filters with a higher corner

INTRODUCTION

Traditionally, Insulated Gate Bipolar Transistors (IGBTs)

frequency, which in turn reduces the value of the filter

based voltage source inverter (VSI) outputs are pulse width

inductor and filter capacitor. The size and cost of the output

modulated at a carrier frequency ranging from 2.0 kHz to 15

sine wave filter also reduces. By supplying near to sinusoidal

kHz. In large power applications, the carrier frequency is

voltage and current waveform into an AC motor reduces the

lower than that in smaller power applications due to thermal

losses associated with PWM waveforms.

Soft

issues pertaining to the power semiconductor in relation with

materials

with

different

chemical

composition that is tailored for high frequency PWM

its current rating.

When high frequency PWM is impressed across the
terminals of an AC motors controlled by a VSI based drive,

applications can be developed to reduce loss in the filter

inductor and improve the overall efficiency of filtering.

there are always voltage transient and insulation breakdown

978-1-4673-0803-8/12/$31.00 2012 IEEE

magnetic

2977

In many AC motor drive applications, it is becoming

necessary to control position, speed and torque to an ever

Section III.

results. Section VI concludes the paper.

increasing degree of precision. Control without the use of

II.

position and speed feedback is almost a requirement in many

demanding applications. Updating the voltage and current
feedback signals more frequently and issuing new command
signals accordingly are desired features to have in a robust
controller. All of this can be brought to bear if there is a
power semiconductor device that can react to the new
command signals at an appropriately fast rate. SiC and GaN
based semiconductor devices are beginning to show such
characteristics.

It is now possible to control kilowatts of

power with the above mentioned semiconductor devices

switching in the 50 to 200 kHz range.

However, it is

important to point out that considering the total time needed to

Section IV and V present experimental test

GAN DEVICE CHARACTERISTICS

In this section, characteristics of the GaN module

employed is discussed. The unit cell device used in this
paper is a GaN hybrid HEMT (High Electron Mobility
Transistor) module.

It incorporates a normally-off low-

voltage Si device at the input and a normally-on highvoltage GaN HEMT at the output in a cascode form. The
combined device is normally-off having a gate threshold of
+2.1V (typical) at 1mA drain current and a drain leakage of
10A (typical) at a gate-source voltage (VGS) of 0V and
drain-source voltage (VDS) of 600V. The structure of the
hybrid HEMT module employed is shown in Fig. 1.

complete complicated mathematical functions for sensor-less

vector control, a practical operating carrier frequency is about
30 kHz to 50 kHz. High power VFDs are presently operated
at a PWM carrier frequency of around 2 kHz to 4 kHz due to
restrictions imposed by Si IGBTs. In the future, due to the
availability of switches like GaN and SiC, these operations can
be carried out at a PWM carrier frequency of 30 kHz to 50
kHz thereby enabling use of smaller sized filter components
Fig. 1: (a) Schematic of a hybrid HEMT GaN module comprising
of a low voltage normally OFF Si MOSFET in series with a
normally ON high voltage GaN HEMT device; (b) Symbol for it.

that can provide clean power to the motors and consequently

improve their reliability.
frequency to achieve high speed robust control is progressing,

A. Turn ON Characteristics
The circuit used for studying the switching characteristics

the present paper focuses on improvement in system efficiency

of the GaN module is shown in Fig. 2.

Though work on exploiting the benefits of high carrier

obtained on using a VFD modulated at 100 kHz with an

output sine wave filter. Experimental results are given to
demonstrate the gain in motor efficiency and system efficiency
on using a GaN based 100 kHz VFD, operating in V/F mode.
Section II discusses the characteristics of the GaN module
employed in the test. It also points out the salient differences
between Si IGBTs and GaN module used.

The design

characteristics of the output sine wave filter is discussed in

2978

Fig. 2: Circuit for evaluating the switching characteristics of GaN

module. Gate driver was made by Transphorm, Inc.

From Fig. 1, it is clear that the turn ON and turn OFF

to remove it quickly to ensure fast turn OFF. In addition,

characteristics of the hybrid HEMT module is influenced by

since the device being turned OFF is a MOSFET, it does not

the characteristics of the series Si based MOSFET switch

require a negative gate drive. In fact, applying a negative

that is used as a cascode switch. This MOSFET is rated for

voltage across gate to source can be counterproductive, since

30V, 11A at a case temperature of 70 deg. C. The total

more energy is needed to flood the space directly under the

switch charge to turn ON the MOSFET is 4.2nC. The turn

gate structure with negative voltage which will create

ON delay time is 8.2ns and the rise time is only 11ns,

positively charged holes under the gate structure. Movement

yielding an excellent turn ON characteristics.

of holes to the surface of the gate requires movement through

Turn ON

waveform is shown in Fig. 3.

500

Vds(V)

a resistive channel which is responsible for power loss.

Also, during turn on process, this charge needs to be replaced

15

Iout(A)

with electrons to establish a conducting channel. The extra

400

12

charge concentration will require extra power and more time

300

to remove this charge, which increases turn off delay time

200

100

and increases turn off gate drive power. Hence, an optimal

-100
8.94

solution will be to simply apply zero volts so that the gatesource junction is shorted with the gate resistance in the
circuit.

board and the GaN HEMT device is unavoidably long, then

-3
8.98

9.02

9.06

9.1

Sometimes, if the trace between the gate driver

one may consider applying a low negative voltage to quickly

9.14

discharge the parasitic capacitance of the trace. In the testing

Fig. 3: Turn ON waveform with inductor current IOUT at 10A.

In Fig. 3, the turn ON delay is measured to be 4nsec and

the turn on rise time is measured to be 3.5nsec. This is much
faster than that achieved using a standard Si based IGBT
with similar voltage and current rating. For example, the
equivalent Si IGBT suitable for comparison is CP30TD1-12
made by Mitsubishi. The best achievable turn ON delay
time is 80nsec and the turn ON rise time for this IGBT is
about 50nsec. Again, the reason can be attributed to the

done here, no negative gate voltage was applied. The turn

OFF characteristics is shown in Fig. 4 below.
From Fig. 4, it is observed that the turn OFF time is
about 15nsec. This is much faster than that achievable using
a standard Si based IGBT with similar voltage and current
rating. The best achievable turn OFF time for CP30TD1-12
per the manufacturer is about 300nsec, with enough negative
gate drive. The reason can be attributed to the fact that

gate-emitter characteristics of the Si IGBT which has a total

500

gate charge of 98nC compared to 4.8nC for the cascode

400

12

switch. Fig. 3 also shows that the turn ON v/t for the

300

GaN HEMT device is about 103kV/sec.

200

100

B. Turn OFF Characteristics

As mentioned earlier, to switch OFF the GaN HEMT

Vds(V)

15

Iout(A)

module, we need to turn OFF the low voltage Si MOSFET.

Since the MOSFET used is low voltage type, the stored
charge in the gate-source junction is very low and it is easy

2979

-100

-3
8.3

8.32

8.34

8.36

8.38

8.4

Fig. 4: Turn OFF waveform with inductor current IOUT at 10A.

unlike MOSFETs, the IGBT has an additional junction,

Since, there is physically no body diode across the GaN

which contributes to tail current during turn OFF process.

HEMT device, it has low losses during turn OFF and is well

This is instrumental in the slower turn OFF characteristics

suited for inverter application in an H-bridge configuration.

observed in IGBTs compared to MOSFETs. The additional

III.

junction also causes parasitic latch up problems as described

in [8]. In order to overcome this latch-up problem, it is
advisable to provide negative gate voltage in case of IGBTs
[8]. In Fig. 4, the turn OFF delay is measured to be 10nsec
and the turn OFF fall rise time is measured to be 7nsec. The
turn OFF v/t is seen to be about 53kV/sec.

OUTPUT SINE WAVE FILTER CHARACTERISTICS

As mentioned in the Introduction section, traditionally

PWM waveforms are applied across AC motor terminals to
operate them at variable speed to achieve desired
performance.

However, AC motors respond to only the

fundamental components and the harmonics associated with

PWM waveform manifest themselves as loss in electric

C. No Free Wheeling Diode in GaN HEMT

It is important to point out that the basic high voltage

motors. This reduces the overall system efficiency. One

GaN based HEMT device is a bidirectional module with high

sine wave filters but as mentioned earlier, a significant part

voltage blocking characteristics when VDS > 0. The actual

of the loss in the motor is simply moved to the filter thereby

conducting part of the HEMT device is a channel of pure

not affecting the overall system efficiency to a great extent.

electron flow in a crystalline structure with no junctions.

When the processed power is large, the switching frequency

Hence current can flow in either direction. Hence, when the

is low which makes the filter bulky and expensive.

way around this is to filter the PWM waveform using output

source voltage is more positive with respect to the drain

Given the fact that high speed switches that can process

terminal, then current can flow in the reverse direction quite

large amounts of power is in near sight, it is conceivable that

efficiently.

The current in the cascode MOSFET flows

the sine wave filters can be designed to have a higher corner

through the body diode of the MOSFET, which has quite

frequency, thereby reducing their size and improving the

good intrinsic turn ON and turn OFF characteristics. Since

filter efficiency since filtering very high frequency

the cascode switch is a low-voltage switch, it has a short drift

components can be achieved using soft magnetic material

region with little charge holding capacity. This significantly

that are characterized by low core losses. In other words,

reduces the reverse recovery charge, Qrr and makes it fast to

making use of power switches that can be efficiently

turn OFF with little power loss. The body diode of the

switched at higher switching frequency, one could design

MOSFET used in the GaN HEMT module here has a

small sized, more efficient output sine wave filters. The

forward drop of only 1V and has a typical reverse recovery

combination of efficient power switches, small sized low

time of 14nsec. The reverse recover charge stored when the

loss sine wave filter can yield drive systems that are more

body diode gets reverse biased (Qrr) is typically about 40nC

efficient than the drive systems that are presently in use.

at 400V, making it to turn ON and turn OFF very fast with

little power loss. Typical values of reverse recovery current
for comparably rated Si IGBT is 200nsec with a Qrr value of
approximately 900nC. This is one of the reasons why a Si
IGBT cannot be switched at 100s of kHz.

In this section, an attempt is made to design a high

frequency sine wave filter using soft magnetic material that
has low loss and good performance. Such a filter is used in
conjunction with the GaN HEMT device in a 6-in-1 module
VFD configuration, operating in V/F mode at a switching
frequency of 100 kHz.

2980

The output sine wave filter shown in Fig. 5(a) is used

5.00

to filter the output PWM waveform so that the line-line

4.00

Vout / Vin

4.50

voltage at the motor terminals is sinusoidal. This also helps

in alleviating the problems associated with high v/t of the

3.50
3.00
2.50
2.00
1.50
1.00

output voltage that causes high surge voltages at the motor

0.50
0.00
1.00E+01

terminals.

1.00E+02

1.00E+03

1.00E+04

1.00E+05

1.00E+06

1.00E+07

1.00E+08

Frequency (Hz)

The resonance frequency (fr) of the sine wave filter is

chosen to be in between the output fundamental frequency
fout and the carrier frequency fc. However, while selecting

(b)
Fig. 5: (a) Schematic of an output LC filter for PWM filtering; (b)
Transfer function of the LC output filter with a load. Red: fc = 3
kHz and fr = 827Hz; Brown: fc = 100 kHz and fr = 25 kHz

The transfer function for a typical LC filter for filtering

the resonant frequency, influence of the leakage inductance

of the motor should also be considered.

The resonance

frequency equation uses the value of filter inductance LF,

the PWM waveform is shown in Fig. 5(b). The attenuation

above the cut-off frequency is high and the filter attenuates
most of the high frequency component. Since the resonant

and the filter capacitance CF as given below.

frequency is much lower than the carrier frequency,

1
fr =
2 LF CF

(1)

damping resistors are not practically required core loss

component in the filter inductor can be used to achieve

To limit the carrier-frequency current into the filter

some damping.

The torque producing fundamental

capacitor, LF should be large. However, excessively large

components (low frequency) are not filtered and are allowed

values for LF should be avoided to limit the fundamental

to pass. The filter capacitor is required to have high current

frequency voltage drop across it under loaded conditions.

handling capacity because of the high frequency current

The resonance frequency fr should be in between the

components that flow into it. However, at higher carrier

fundamental output frequency fout, and carrier frequency fc,

frequencies, the value of the filter capacitor needed is small

i.e. fout << fr << fc. Since it is now possible to use a high

and so the capacitor current is well contained. Studies have

carrier frequency, the value of fr can be chosen to be much

shown that keeping the inverter switching frequency to be at

higher than traditionally done with IGBT drives. From (1),

it is clear that higher resonant frequency selection yields a

least five to seven times the resonant frequency of the low pass
filter yields optimum results.

much lower value for the inductance and capacitance of the

output sine wave filter.

In Fig. 5(b), the traditional filter (shown in red color) is

designed with a resonant frequency of 480Hz for a carrier
frequency of 3 kHz.

Including the load impedance, the

resonant frequency is 827Hz (LF= 2.1mH, CF= 18F).

Increasing the carrier frequency to 100 kHz (shown in
brown color) allows the resonant frequency to be as high as
25 kHz. The resonating inductor needed is only 69H. The
(a)

resonating capacitor needed is only 0.6F. This allows for

significant reduction in size and cost of the filter.
Fig. 5(b) also shows that having the capability of
switching the inverter switches at 100 kHz, allows operation

2981

at higher fundamental frequency which is useful in many

the GaN based inverter was operated with a sine wave filter

high speed applications, like centrifuges, compressors, etc.

and the loss of sine wave filter is included in the drive

IV.

efficiency calculations, while the Si based inverter was

EXPERIMENTAL SETUP AND TEST RESULTS

Tests were conducted to compare the inverter and system

operated without any output sine wave filter.

This section discusses the results obtained from these tests.

A. Test Results
Efficiency test results are given in Table 1 for GaN based

The test setup is shown in Fig. 6. The filter inductor in the

drive and in Table 2 for the standard Si based drive made by

case of GaN based drive is 0.22mH and the filter capacitor is

Yaskawa. Overall system efficiency is measured taking the

0.1F, resulting in an approximate corner frequency of 34

transducer power as output and DC power as input. The

kHz. Both the Si based drive and the GaN based drives were

system is loaded in steps of 0.2 kW up to the rated power of

powered from an external DC power source.

2.0 kW. Command frequency for both drives is kept at

efficiency between a Si based drive and a GaN based drive.

Pin is the

electrical input power, Po is the AC output power and Pm is

60Hz. Efficiency plots are shown in Fig. 9.

the mechanical shaft power. Photograph of a GaN inverter is

It should be noted that the Si IGBT based inverter was

shown in Fig. 7. Schematic of the test setup employing a

tested with no sine wave filter. This was deliberately done to

standard IGBT based drive is shown in Fig. 8.

investigate the extra losses that are incurred in the AC motor

For efficiency calculations, the DC input is considered as

the electrical input power. Figs. 6 and 8 also show the points

due to PWM waveform. The distance between the drive and

the AC motor in both cases was maintained at 3m.

where measurements were made. It is important to note that

Fig. 6: Schematic of the test setup for the GaN based drive.

Fig. 7: Photograph of GaN module and inverter with the GaN module. Sample shown was used for the test. Electrical specifications:
Vce = 600[V], Output current Io=14[A], 6-in-1 module.

2982

Fig. 8: Schematic of the test setup for the Si based drive operating with a carrier frequency of 15 kHz.
Table 1: Measured efficiency for GaN based drive

GaN
INPUT
OUTPUT
Power
Efficiency
Vdc[V] Idc[A] Vo[V]
Output
Pin[kW] Po[kW] Pm[kW] Drive
Motor
System
Output
target
(Vuv,Vvw,V current
Efficiency
efficiency
Efficiency
No Load 325.6 0.915
228.61
4.038
0.298 0.279 0.104
93.64
37.43
35.05
0.4 323.7 1.349
226.98
4.087
0.437 0.417 0.269
95.58
64.36
61.51
0.6 321.2 1.901
224.74
4.208
0.611 0.591 0.403
96.73
68.19
65.95
0.8 319.2 2.572
222.92
4.441
0.821 0.800 0.612
97.34
76.51
74.47
1.0 318.0 3.246
221.71
4.750
1.033 1.009 0.791
97.71
78.36
76.57
1.2 316.7 3.908
220.44
5.102
1.239 1.212 0.970
97.87
80.01
78.30
1.4 315.9 4.497
219.46
5.451
1.421 1.392 1.134
97.92
81.47
79.77
1.6 314.5 5.202
218.01
5.893
1.637 1.603 1.343
97.96
83.75
82.04
1.8 314.5 5.830
217.56
6.328
1.834 1.797 1.507
97.98
83.88
82.19
2.0 312.8 6.529
212.98
6.851
2.043 2.000 1.686
97.91
84.30
82.54
Table 2: Measured efficiency for Si-IGBT drive

Si-IGBT
Output
target
No Load
0.4
0.6
0.8
1.0
1.2
1.4
1.6
1.8
2.0

INPUT
OUTPUT
Power
Efficiency
Vdc[V] Idc[A] Vo[V]
Output
Pin[kW] Po[kW] Pm[kW] Drive
Motor
System
(Vuv,Vvw,V current
Efficiency
efficiency
Efficiency
325.3 1.221
228.09
4.071 0.397 0.363
0.119
93.67
32.90
30.82
324.8 1.426
227.72
4.106 0.463 0.429
0.194
94.51
45.25
42.77
322.0 1.998
225.23
4.220 0.644 0.608
0.358
95.96
58.88
56.50
321.9 2.574
224.49
4.433 0.829 0.792
0.537
96.69
67.83
65.58
320.7 3.301
222.47
4.759 1.059 1.020
0.761
97.22
74.61
72.54
319.0 3.950
220.41
5.105 1.261 1.220
0.940
97.51
77.06
75.14
318.2 4.691
219.06
5.564 1.493 1.449
1.134
97.69
78.28
76.47
317.4 5.250
218.23
5.946 1.666 1.621
1.283
97.86
79.15
77.45
316.3 5.912
217.18
6.403 1.870 1.822
1.477
97.95
81.07
79.40
314.7 6.588
215.88
6.884 2.074 2.022
1.656
97.98
81.89
80.24

2983

98.5

90.0

98.0

80.0

97.5
System Efficiency Pm/Pin[%]

Drive Efficiency Po/Pin[%]

70.0

97.0
96.5
96.0
95.5
95.0
94.5

50.0
40.0
30.0
20.0

Si-IGBT

94.0

60.0

Si-IGBT

GaN

GaN

10.0

93.5

0.0

93.0
0.0

0.5

1.0

1.5

0.0

2.0

0.2

0.4

0.6

0.8

1.0

1.2

1.4

1.6

1.8

Output Power of Motor Pm[kW]

Output Power of Drive Po[kW]

(a)
(b)
Fig. 9: (a) Efficiency of inverter with respect to output electrical power (without motor efficiency); (b) System efficiency (mechanical output
power to electrical input power) as a function of mechanical output power

V.

at 100 kHz is seen to be much lower than Si based IGBT

CONCLUSIONS

In this paper, the operating characteristics of a normally

inverter operating at 15 kHz. The size of the output sine

ON GaN HEMT device with a normally OFF low voltage Si

wave filter is very small as can be seen in Fig. 7. The loss

based MOSFET in cascode has been discussed. It has been

in the sine wave filter is much lower than the extra losses

shown that the cascode combination is well suited for bridge

seen in the AC motor when no filter was used. The absence

configurations since the resulting device has the advantage

of audible PWM noise in the motor and in the output sine

of low switching losses, low conduction losses, and

wave filter was noticeable.

operation that does not require any external freewheeling

diode. Advantages of high PWM carrier frequency have

REFERENCES
[1]

also been highlighted. Test results show that the inverter

efficiency as well as the system efficiency is higher using a

[2]

GaN based PWM drive operating at a carrier frequency of

100 kHz. It is important to point out that most variable
frequency applications do not operate at rated load all the
time.

[3]
[4]

Statistically speaking, most pump and fan

applications that use V/F mode of operation, operate at

around 50% to 70% load condition.

[5]

From the results

presented here, the light load system efficiency observed for

[6]

the GaN based VFD system is much better than that for the
Si IGBT based VFD system.
Further, GaN based drive with an output sine wave
filter has better efficiency compared to the Si based drive

[7]

[8]

without a sine wave filter. In other words, the switching and

conduction loss in the 6-in-1 GaN HEMT device operating

2984

M. Ishida, Y. Uemoto, T.Ueda, T. Tanaka, and D.Ueda, GaN

Switching Power Devices, 2010 International Power Electronics
Conference, pp. 1014-1017
Michael J. Melfi, Quantifying the Energy Efficiency of Motors on
Inverters,
IEEE
Industry
Applications
Magazine,
November/December 2011.
Induction Motors Fed by PWM Frequency Inverters, Technical
guide, WEG Motors, www.weg.net.
A. Boglietti, A. Cavagnino, and A. M. Knight, Isolating the impact
of PWM modulation on motor iron losses IEEE IAS Annual
Meeting, 2008.
Dan M. Ionel, Mircea Popescu, Malcolm I. McGilp, T. J. E. Miller,
Stephen J. Dellinger, and Robert J. Heideman, Computation of Core
Losses in Electrical Machines Using Improved Models for Laminated
Steel, IEEE Transactions on Industry Applications, Vol. 43, No, 6,
November/December 2007.
A. Boglietti, A. Cavagnino, and M. Lazzari, Fast Method for the
Iron Loss Prediction in Inverter-Fed Induction Motors IEEE
Transactions on Industry Applications, Vol. 46, No, 2, March/April
2010.
Christopher J. Melhourne, and Le Tang, Transient Effects of PWM
Drives on Induction Motors, IEEE IAS Annual Meeting, 1995, pp.
59-65.
Mahesh M. Swamy, Tsuneo Kume, and Noriyuki Takada, An
Efficient Resonant Gate-Drvie Scheme for High-Frequency
Applications, IEEE Transactions on Industry Applications, vol. 48,
No. 4, July/August 2012.