An Assessment of Immersion Cooling for Power Electronics: an Oil Volume Case Study

Abstract

Power Electronics demand appropriate heat dissipation to secure life span, reliability, and power density. Among several cooling methods, oil immersion is an efficient and cost effective one. Natural convection is the most reliable considering the lack of pumps and fans compared to others practical ways of immersion cooling. However, the heat flow is depended on several variables. To better understand natural cooling motion, the oil volume and heat transfer area are discussed for a power electronic device. Computational fluid dynamics (CFD) simulations and experimental results are used for the sake of comprehensiveness.