High-Efficiency Frequency Control Scheme for Electric Propulsion Systems in Low Earth Orbit Satellites

Authors:
Publisher website
Google Scholar
Abstract
With the growing complexity of satellite missions, research on electric propulsion (EP) systems is becoming more important due to their high energy efficiency and longer operational lifespans. In addition, as satellite bus voltages rise from 50 to 300–400 V to support high-power EP systems, the development of high-power and high-efficiency power systems has become essential. Among the various power processing units in EP systems, heater power converters play a crucial role in regulating temperature for propellant vaporization and plasma ignition processes. The half-bridge type topologies are generally considered to handle the high input bus voltage of the heater power system. However, the half-bridge LLC converter has drawbacks related to performance degradation under large temperature fluctuations and reduced efficiency under wide input voltage variations in space environments, and the asymmetrical half-bridge (AHB) converter suffers from insufficient zero-voltage switching (ZVS) energy under light load conditions, resulting in low efficiency. Therefore, this article proposes a frequency control scheme for the AHB converter to enhance efficiency under light load conditions in EP heater power applications. By decreasing the switching frequency under light load conditions, the proposed control scheme secures sufficient ZVS energy, resulting in high efficiency without requiring additional components or redesign of magnetic components. A prototype with the proposed control scheme is implemented to validate its effectiveness and feasibility under 250–400 V input and 12 V/20 A output specifications.
Funding Information
  • Ministry of Science and ICT, South Korea
  • ICT Challenge and Advanced Network of HRD support program (IITP-2025-RS-2022-00156212)
  • Institute for Information and Communications Technology Planning and Evaluation
  • National Research Foundation of Korea (2018R1A6A1A03026005)

This publication has 28 references indexed in Scilit: