ON Semiconductor and Ampt announced a partnership to help photovoltaic power plant suppliers improve energy efficiency

     ON Semiconductor and Ampt LLC, the world's number one DC optimizer company for large-scale photovoltaic (PV) solar and energy storage systems, announced a partnership to meet the high demand for DC series optimizers. Ampt uses Anson Beauty's EliteSiC series silicon carbide (SiC) technology N-channel SiC mosFeTs in its DC series optimizer for critical power switching applications.

     The Ampt series optimizer is used in large-scale photovoltaic power plants, enabling lower cost and higher performance solar and DC coupled energy storage systems to be co-deployed in solar power plants. The string optimizer delivers power from the PV array at high fixed voltages in the system voltage range of 600 VDC to 1500 VDC, reducing the overall current requirements and costs of the plant. The Ampt optimizer utilizes the latest SiC MOSEFT technology with extremely low on-off resistance and switching losses to achieve higher bi-directional charge and discharge efficiency for energy storage systems and solar power plants.

     "Incorporating ON Semiconductor's EliteSiC technology into our DC optimizer helps large PV plant developers improve the economics of their projects," said Levent Gun, CEO of Ampt. "Obviously, product performance was a key decision point for us, and Anson Semiconductor proved to be a strong partner by providing technical support during the design phase and continued supply guarantees to support Ampt's rapid expansion."

     The typical RDS(on) value of EliteSiC devices is 80 mΩ and the grid charge (Qg) value is 56 nC, with a low Rg of 1.7Ohms. Its ability to operate at junction temperatures up to 175°C reduces thermal management requirements in applications, leading to smaller, less costly solutions.

     "Our EliteSiC technology combines high performance with high reliability, enabling the efficient, reliable DC optimizer that an industry leader like Ampt has come to expect," said Simon Keeton, executive vice president and general manager, Power Solutions, ON Semiconductor. We look forward to continuing to work together to develop new products and move renewable energy applications forward to build a sustainable ecosystem."