Computer-Based Investigations on the Reliability, Robustness, and Failure Mechanisms of High-Power Devices

Todays state of the art of predictive high-fidelity computer simulation of “failure and virtual destruction” is illustrated with reference to selected real-life examples as encountered in electrical energy technology. It aims in particular at high-power devices employed in the generation and recovery, the transmission and distribution, and the consumption of electrical power in our modern high-tech societies, which in future have to rely on regenerative energy sources like wind farms and photovoltaics, highly efficient power grids, and environment-friendly trans-portation like electromobility. All this is today supported by realistic computer simulations on the basis of well-calibrated physical device models. The challenge is to make virtual experiments and tests on the computer, which are qualitatively reliable and quantitatively accurate even for device structures that have never been built before, and under operational conditions that very rarely occur as long as the device is kept within the “safe operating area (SOA)”. What we are interested in is to explore the rim of the SOA and even to go beyond it in order to study failure and, eventually, destruction mechanisms with a view to improving robustness and reliability of the devices.