$2.2 million contract for power semiconductor technology to modernise the electrical power grid

HexaTech has received a $2.2 million award from the US Department of Energy Advanced Research Projects Agency - Energy (ARPA-E) that will enable the development of a new power semiconductor technology for the modernisation of the electrical power grid. HexaTech’s aluminium nitride (AlN) technology was identified by the Department of Energy as a transformational, breakthrough technology with significant technical promise.

Using low dislocation density, single-crystal AlN substrates, HexaTech will develop novel doping schemes and contact metals for AlN/AlGaN with high Al content. Dr Baxter Moody, Director of Engineering, said, “This contract marks the beginning of a technological leap in device performance and efficiency for power semiconductors. The development will enable a significant step toward producing 20 kV AlN-based Schottky diodes (SBD, JBSD) and transistors (JFET, MOSFET). The ARPA-E contract has opened the door for the material development and research to demonstrate AlN high-voltage, high-efficiency power conversion capability.”

For power systems and grid-scale power conversion applications, high-efficiency AlN-based power devices will offer a significant reduction in size, weight and cooling.

Power semiconductor devices at this level are not currently available on the market. Experimental devices based on silicon carbide (SiC) technology are currently being developed. Compared to SiC technology, it is expected that aluminium nitride will enable power electronics with a 10x improvement in performance.

Based on the wide bandgap material properties of AlN, the critical field is 6x larger, the on-resistance will be lower and the resulting power device area will be smaller for a comparable power level. This transformational technology could revolutionise the power distribution grid.