December 2010

SPECIAL REPORT: RENEWABLE ENERGY (Pg 25)

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Efficiency vs Output Current (A)

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VIEWpoint

Renewables and Revenues By Cliff Keys, Editorial Director & Editor-in-Chief, PSDE

POWERline

Inductive Components For Renewables

POWERplayer

Challenges For Renewable Energy By Thomas Grasshoff, Semikron

MARKETwatch

Renewable Energy Markets Continue To Shine By Ash Sharma, IMS Research

DESIGNtips

Power Supply Development Diary Part IX By Dr. Ray Ridley, Ridley Engineering

COVER STORY

The Promise of Solar

Technology

By Peter Haff, Fairchild Semiconductor

TECHNICAL FEATURES

Power Modules

LI-Ion Battery Circuit Protection,By Ty Bowman, Tyco

Thermal Management

By David Connett, EPCOS AG

SPECIAL REPORT: Renewable Energy

Renewable Energy & Energy

Saving

By Alberto Guerra, International Rectifier

The Energy Harvest

By Steve Knoth, Linear Technology

Renewables at University

By PhD Salvador Segui Chilet and Victoria Devesa, Universidad Politécnica de Valencia

Pushing Power Capability

By Werner Obermaier, Vincotech

Power From Renewables

By Cuijiao Ma & Song Gaosheng, Mitsubishi & Haitao Xiang & Haijiang Jiang, Shanghai Aerospace-Sharp Electronics

4

CAREERdevelopment

Solar Inverter Industry Offers Talented Engineers The Chance To Shine, By David G. Morrison, Editor, How2Power.com

GREENpage

Green Sun Reported By Cliff Keys, Editor-in-Chief, PSDE

Dilbert

21

COVER STORY

The Promise of Solar Technology (pg 13)

11

52

52

47

17

13

10

8

43

38

34

30

26

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Highlighted Products News, Industry News and more

web-only content, to:

www.powersystemsdesign.com

3WWW.POWERSYSTEMSDESIGN.COM

POWER SYSTEMS DESIGN 2010DECEMBER

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Features Plug-and-Play solution 1W output power 15A gate current

Next generation inverter designs for renewable energy applications

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Dubilier’s expanded range of Type 947C power fi lm capacitors meet or

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APPLIED VOLTAGE TO 1300 Vdc

RIPPLE CURRENT RATINGS TO 100 Arms

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4

VIEWpoint

WWW.POWERSYSTEMSDESIGN.COM

POWER SYSTEMS DESIGN

Welcome to this issue of PSD where we present a special feature on renewable energy.

The focus on renewables - and especially energy harvesting, has certainly hit the industry’

s headlines over the past year. Apart from being good for the environment and good for the

power electronics industry, it is a sought after lever for governments and administrations to

attract ‘clean votes’. With previous waves of engineering graduates trained in analog, logic

and DSP technologies, maybe the next wave will be qualified as energy harvesting experts

encompassing all of the above. It most likely hangs on the investment made now in education

at this level, which probably depends heavily on the state of the economy and government

priorities, to use a broad-brush term. Hopefully this relatively new industry will spawn the next

wave of valuable and talented engineers who will take up and solve the real challenges facing

our energy-hungry environment.

After nearly two years of unimpressive performance, the recovery of the global market for

Uninterruptible Power Supplies (UPS) is picking up momentum. The industry on 3Q-2010

performed 12.9% higher than 3Q-2009, according to IMS Research. There were strong UPS

sales in Asia and the Americas, while the debt crisis in Europe is still hampering its revival.

China and India remain the engines of growth in Asia with a rapid uptake in shipments across

all sectors. Without question, Asia is now a major focus of supplier attention. In the span

of five years, Asia has grown its share of the global market from 25% to 33%. The market

in Europe, Middle East and Africa has not improved to the degree of those in Asia and the

Americas, where UPS revenues remain roughly the same as in 2009.

The rapid recovery in automotive production and inventory rebuilding among sensor

component suppliers has set the market for automotive MEMS sensors to expand to record

size in 2010, according to iSuppli. Marking a new high-point for the industry, shipments

of automotive MEMS sensors will reach 662.3 million units in 2010, up 32.1% from 501.2

million units in 2009. The recovery in automotive MEMS shipments represents a turnaround

from the depressed levels of 2009 when shipments reached a nadir, and the years ahead will

provide additional room for expansion. One significant source for automotive MEMS growth

is the use of sensors in passenger cars supporting mandated safety technologies such as

electronic stability control (ESC) and tyre pressure monitoring systems (TPMS). The United

States and Europe lead the adoption of legislation on such safety systems – with many other

countries following suit.

I hope you enjoy this issue with the ongoing improvements to the magazine and website design

based on your valuable feedback. And please check out Dilbert at the back of the magazine.

All the best,

Cliff

Editorial Director & Editor-in-Chief, Power Systems Design

Cliff.Keys@powersystemsdesign.com

RENEWABLES AND REVENUESAGS Media Group

146 Charles Street Annapolis, MD 21401 USATel: +410.295.0177 Fax: +510.217.3608 www.powersystemsdesign.com

Editorial Director & Editor-in-Chief Cliff Keys cliff.keys@powersystemsdesign.com

Contributing Editors

Liu Hong, Editor-in-Chief, Power Systems Design China powersdc@126.com

Ash Sharma, IMS Research Ash.sharma@imsresearch.com

Dr. Ray Ridley, Ridley Engineering RRidley@ridleyengineerng.com

David Morrison, How2Power david@how2power.com

Publishing Director Jim Graham jim.graham@powersystemsdesign.com

Publisher Julia Stocks Julia.stocks@powersystemsdesign.com

Circulation Management Kathryn Phillips Kathryn.phillips@powersystemsdesign.com

Research Director Meghan Corneal Meghan.corneal@powersystemsdesign.com

Magazine Design Louis C. Geiger louis@agencyofrecord.com

Production Manager Leo Jiang leow@action-new.net

Volume 7, Issue 10

Registration of copyright: January 2004ISSN number: 1613-6365

AGS Media Group and Power Systems Design Europe magazine assume and hereby disclaim any liability to any person for any loss or damage by errors or omissions in the material contained herein regardless of whether such errors result from negligence, accident or any other cause whatsoever.

Send address changes to:circulation@powersystemsdesign.com.

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