Magnetic Shielding Design for Coupler of Wireless Electric Vehicle Charging Using Finite Element Analysis

Inductive power transfer (IPT) is a practical and preferable method for wireless electric vehicle (EV) charging which proved to be safe, convenient and reliable. Due to the air gap between the magnetic coupler, the magnetic field coupling decreases and the magnetic leakage increases significantly compared to traditional transformer, and this may lead to the magnetic flux density around the coupler more than the safety limit for human. So magnetic shielding should be adding to the winding made from litz wire to enhance the magnetic field coupling effect in the working area and reduce magnetic field strength in non-working area. Magnetic shielding can be achieved by adding high-permeability material or high-conductivity material. For high-permeability material its magnetic reluctance is much lower than the surrounding air medium so most of the magnetic line goes through the high-permeability material rather than surrounding air. For high-conductivity material the eddy current in the material can produce reverse magnetic field to achieve magnetic shielding. This paper studies the effect of the two types of shielding material on coupler for wireless EV charging and designs combination shielding made from high-permeability material and high-conductivity material. The investigation of the paper is done with the help of finite element analysis.