With the growth in renewable energy sources (like windmills and solar power plants), decentralized power generation will become an important part of the total electric supply chain. Renewables in particular will continue to increase their share as conventional sources get more expensive and are not favored due to their impact on the environment. There are many projections indicating that the share of renewables will continue to rise; from a conservative 8 percent estimate by the EIA to a 30 percent estimate by Greenpeace and the European Renewable Energy Council.
Among the fastest growing applications that considerably benefit from this trend are solar inverters for photovoltaic systems as used on roof tops and for photovoltaic power plants. Infineon’s IGBTs, MOSFETs such as CoolMOS™, Mikrocontrollers as well as very innovative Silicon Carbide devices in power modules and stacks help to raise solar inverters’ efficiency to up to 98 percent and to feed as much of solar-based electricity into the power grid as possible.