Hello everyone! I am excited to find out that the US Department of Energy has established something called the FreedomCAR and Fuel Partnership which you can read about at http://www1.eere.energy.gov/vehiclesandfuels/about/partnerships/freedomcar/.
If you tunnel in a bit you find out that there are strong thoughts that wide bandgap semiconductors will find their way into future automobiles because of their ability to enable higher electrical efficiency while simultaneously operating at higher temperatures which then enables reduced cooling needs. For example, see pages 19 & 20 of http://www1.eere.energy.gov/vehiclesandfuels/pdfs/program/eett_roadmap.pdf.
You see, today's hybrid electric vehicles like the Toyota Prius require an extra water cooling line to cool off that hot set of silicon electronics for the inverter and other parts of the electronics helping the hybrid do its thing. Silicon gets very hot because it wastes so much electricity. This is very cool for gallium nitride and silicon carbide since both offer major benefits, not only in electrical efficiency, but also because they can handle higher current densities so you can make them smaller, and because they can be run much hotter (due to higher bandgaps) which means less cooling needs.
Will GaN beat SiC or will SiC win? Or will both GaN and SiC have a place in future automobile power electronics? Well, I am placing my bets on GaN. But however it comes out, its sure gonna be a fun ride!
Yours truly,
Captain Nitride
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