Power electronic converters are essential part of hybrid fuel cell automotive application systems. The converter needs to provide high-voltage ratio for a wide range of input voltage. In addition, the converter should have high efficiency for a wide range of duty cycle control range. A four-phase floating interleaved boost converter (FIBC) is analysed and a small-signal AC model using an averaged pulse-width modulation (PWM) switch technique is used for supporting the feedback controller and aiding a frequency response design. The small-signal AC model as well as the current controller are validated by simulation and evaluated by experimental results. The proposed converter has competitive device ratings, the total inductance volume and weight is decreased, current ripple is minimised and converter efficiency and reliability are improved. Proof of concept of the proposed topology is demonstrated through an experimental prototype.

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Electric vehicle technology has been adopting fuel cells (FCs) for hybrid applications over the past few years. Therefore, the development of advanced power electronic systems for the integration of fuel cells with on-board energy management is fundamental for achieving high-performance systems. An FC for vehicular applications is usually a low-voltage current-source like device that produces electricity and heat directly from input hydrogen and oxygen. Most often, it is required that the FCs be stacked for high-voltage dc-link in order to supply the input power for the drivetrain and electric motor drive system. The FC has a nonlinear nature, and it must be controlled to operate in the highefficiency operating range. Hybrid electric vehicles have physical constraints such as volume and weight under limited cost and expected lifetime. There is a need for high-voltage input/output ratio of dc-dc boost converters to be connected between the FC to the motor drive dc-link. In addition, it is necessary to have low input ripple at the dc-dc boost converter in order to maximize the FC lifetime, and the traditional dc-dc boost converter topologies have poor performance on these specifications. This paper proposes a new dc-dc converter family of topologies aimed at improving the application to electric vehicle power control. This family is defined as floating-interleaving boost converters (FIBCs). The paper will thoroughly show analysis and experimental verification of FIBC's, and they will be compared with conventional boost converter characteristics. The paper supports how performance figures related to the passive components, i.e., the inductor and capacitor, will have better volume and weight, extremely low input current ripple, and improved efficiency and transfer ratio. The analysis presented in this paper shows how to choose the most suitable topology in order to achieve the desired specifications. The selected topology is fully validated experimentally using advanced nonlinear sliding mode control, which has the additional feature of operating even in faulty conditions. Index Terms-Boost converter, dc-dc converter, fuel cell (FC) hybrid vehicle, sliding mode control. Manuscript

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A bidirectional dc-dc power converter is an essential part of a HFCEV (Hybrid Fuel Cell Electric Vehicle) and renewable energy hybrid system. This paper presents a new bidirectional dc-dc power converter for HFCEV and renewable energy hybrid systems. The proposed converter is called four phases floating interleaved boost converter. Two control strategies of the dc-bus voltage are discussed. In the first one, a dual loop with linear current and voltage controllers is developed, based on the frequency response of the system. In the second one, the linear current controller is replaced by a non-linear sliding mode current controller, to improve the system performance from the robustness point of view. The non-linear sliding mode controller is designed based on the average model of the proposed topology. The proposed control strategies have been validated by simulation and experimental results. V C 2015 AIP Publishing LLC.

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