A Wireless EV Charging Topology With Integrated Energy Storage

This article presents a wireless power transfer topology based on inductive power transfer (IPT) with integrated supercapacitor (SC) energy storage. The proposed topology is suitable for dynamic charging of electric vehicles (EVs), where pulses of energy must be processed without placing excessive strain on the utility grid or the EV battery. This topology extends the functionality of a typical LCL-tuned bidirectional IPT system by adding the ability to store energy in an SC in a controlled manner. Operation of the system is described in terms of the switching patterns and control variables required to transfer energy between the input, output, and the SCs. A mathematical model that predicts the overall transfer of power between the input, output, and SCs is presented along with experimental results at a nominal power level of 3.8 kW to validate the model and the topology under a variety of typical operating conditions.