A High-Voltage Transients Suppressor Diode

Inverters based on power switches, such as IGBTs, in either resonant or hard-switching topologies can, during or after a load-fault, exhibit a transient overvoltage at the collector-emitter leads. In such an event, the maximum allowed collectoremitter voltage may be exceeded and the power switch destroyed. To avoid this, some form of active clamping may be used. In this work, we present a concept of a single possibly co-packed, high-voltage TVS-diode with typical breakdown voltages ranging from 1.2 to 1.7 kV.