Professor Tore M. Undeland is Professor Emeritus at the Department of Electric Power Engineering at the Norwegian University of Science and Technology (NTNU).
"An impressive achievement" - Dr. Tore Undeland comments on the Rectiverter
Professor Tore M. Undeland is Professor Emeritus at the Department of Electric Power Engineering at the Norwegian University of Science and Technology (NTNU).
His career in power conversion spans 50 years as a student, research fellow and professor at NTNU.
Professor Undeland comments:
"Bidirectionality is not a new concept, as such. The new thing is the integration of three functions inside a standard-sized module - with few transistors so as to keep the very low losses. This is a great challenge when turning the power flow in the opposite direction. To achieve this, the converters are tightly integrated into each other, which also makes production cost-effective and the product competitive."
The integration of three converters into one module, with bidirectional power flow and high efficiency, is an impressive achievement
Professor Tore Undeland
Professor Undeland has followed Eltek closely from outside for a long time. He is a central academic veteran in the international power conversion community, and many of his graduates over the years have found their way to the Eltek R&D labs.
"Over the years, Eltek has built considerable expertise and their rectifier and battery charger technology is among, if not the best, in the world. The Rectiverter is a new concept - not a unit you will find described in our text books at the University - not yet. The Rectiverter has been invented and named by Eltek."
Professor Undeland sees an important role for bidirectional power supplies. "For the individual company and application, everything becomes easier and more flexible with multi-output converters. And on the global scale, the world has to - and will - shift its energy consumption from oil and coal to renewable electric power without emissions - photovoltaics, wind and so on.
But there is one major obstable - electricity is only an energy carrier. The ability to store electric energy efficiently and cost-effectively will be the key to a sustainable energy supply in the future.
