Conducted EMI filter design

for SMPS

Jukka-Pekka Sjöroos
Helsinki University of Technology
Power Electronics Laboratory

Conducted EMI filter design for SMPS

• Introduction
• EMI in SMPS
• Common Mode(CM) noise
• Differential Mode(DM) noise
• Minimizing EMI in SMPS design
• Measuring conducted EMI
• EMI filter design
• Emi filter components
• Emi filter topology
• Calculating CM filter component values
• Calculating DM filter component values
• Determining filter corner frequencies
• Design steps
• Conclusions
4/20/2004 Conducted EMI filter design for 2
SMPS

1
 Introduction
• The threat of generating EMI from the fast switching pulses in SMPS has always been a
serious concern
• Thus achieving the electromagnetic compatibility (EMC) has become a requirement as
important as meeting the power conversion specifications
• EMI includes three elements
• Source of the electromagnetic emission
• Coupling path
• A receiver of the EMI (victim)
• Conducted emissions 150kHz-30MHz
• Common mode(CM) measured between each power line and ground
• Differential mode measured between power lines
• Radieted emissions 30MHz-1GHz

4/20/2004 Conducted EMI filter design for 3

SMPS

EMI in SMPS
• Because of the fast switching in SMPS they generate large amount of electromagnetic
interferences and that’s usually the reason for SMPS not to comply the EMC standards
• EMI filter is usually needed in the input of the SMPS to achieve the required standards
• Conducted emissions 150kHz-30MHz
– CM common mode emissions :
paracitic capacitances and the switching voltage waveform across the switch

du
→ i CM = C par
dt
– DM differential emissions:
The swiching action causes current pulses at the input

di
→ u switching spike =L
dt
Thus switching spikes exist as a differential mode noise source
• Radiated emissions 30MHz-1GHZ
– Magnetic and Elecric fields

4/20/2004 Conducted EMI filter design for 4

SMPS

2
 EMI in SMPS
• Operation conditions also affects to the filter design
• The worst case should be always considered
– Highest input voltage leads to peak du/dt value
→

CM noise will be maximum

– Lowest input voltage and maximum load current would lead to peak di/dt value
→

DM noise will be maximum

4/20/2004 Conducted EMI filter design for 5

SMPS

EMI in SMPS
Sources of CM noise

4/20/2004 Conducted EMI filter design for 6

SMPS

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 EMI in SMPS
Sources of DM noise
• The switching action of the power mosfet causes
current pulses at the input and voltage ripple at the
output

4/20/2004 Conducted EMI filter design for 7

SMPS

EMI in SMPS
Minimizing EMI in SMPS design
• Because of economical reasons EMC has to be considered in the early stage of the SMPS design
• Combating CM EMI
• The parasitic capacitances of heatsink and transformer are two major components to cause CM
EMI in SMPS
• CM EMI can be minimized by minimizing stray capacitances between the circuit and ground
• Component selection

• Combating DM EMI
• Semiconductor devices like power mosfet are usually DM EMI sources
• Proper layout design can reduce DM EMI for example wires that carries a switching waveform
should be as close as possible to each other
• Emi sensitive circuits like control circuits should not locate near circuit elements that carries the
switching waveform. The goal is to prevent electromagnetic coupling between these circuits
• The use of RC-snubbers is to reduce ringing and protect the switch
• Component selection

4/20/2004 Conducted EMI filter design for 8

SMPS

4
 Measuring conducted EMI
• LISN Line Impedance Stabilization Network
• Filters the high-frequency noise signals from the input current
• Creates a standard load impedance (50 ) at the measurement point

4/20/2004 Conducted EMI filter design for 9

SMPS

Measuring conducted EMI

Test setup for conducted EMI measurement
• The noise voltage is measured across 50
resistor in the Spectrum analyzer
• The powerline LISN measures CM + DM
• The neutral return measures CM - DM
• CM noise sees two 50 resistor in parallel one in LISN and another in Spectrum analyzer 25


total
while DM noise sees two 50 resistor in series total 100

4/20/2004 Conducted EMI filter design for 10

SMPS

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 EMI filter design
Emi filter components
• Both DM and CM noises should be attenuated
• Suppressing DM noise: DM inductors and X-capacitors
• Suppressing CM noise CM inductors and Y-capacitors
• Y-capacitors and Lleakage of the CM inductor attenuates also
DM noise
• DM inductors attenuates also CM noise

4/20/2004 Conducted EMI filter design for 11

SMPS

EMI filter design

Emi filter topology
CM and DM equivalent circuits

4/20/2004 Conducted EMI filter design for 12

SMPS

6
 Calculating CM filter component values

4/20/2004 Conducted EMI filter design for 13

SMPS

Calculating DM filter component values

4/20/2004 Conducted EMI filter design for 14

SMPS

7
 Determining filter corner frequencies

4/20/2004 Conducted EMI filter design for 15

SMPS

Emi filter design

Design steps
• The goal is to meet the low frequency
requirements
• Class A industrial and commercial
applications
• Class B residential equipments

• Filter design
• step 1 Measure CM noise and DM noise
without the filter
• step 2 Calculate required CM attenuation and
DM attenuation

(U req ,CM ) dB = (U CM ) dB − (U lim it ) dB

(U req , DM ) dB = (U DM ) dB − (U lim it ) dB

4/20/2004 Conducted EMI filter design for 16

SMPS

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 Emi filter design
Design steps
• step 3: Determine filter corner frequencys by drawing a 40db/dec slope which is tangent to the
required attenuation for DM and CM
• Step 4: Calculate component values
CM components:
Cy is limited to 3300pF because of safety reasons and the corner frequency fR,CM has been found in step
3 so we get the common mode inductor
2
 1 
L C =   * 1
 2C
 2π * f R ,CM  y

DM components:
There is freedom of choosing differential mode inductor Ldm . To reduce cost and size of the filter often
manufactures use only common mode inductor’s leakage inductance Lleakage as DM inductor. The
corner frequency fR,DM has been found in step 3. Thus the DM capacitors are

2
 1 
C X 1 = C X 2 = C DM =   * 1

 2π * f R ,CM  L leakage

4/20/2004 Conducted EMI filter design for 17

SMPS

Conclusions
A simple method for designing input filter for SMPS has been presented. This
design method is quick and it meets the conducted emission
requirements. The component selection is made according the required
Insertion loss. After little modification to the layout and wire contstruction
would made the filter also meet the radiated emission requirements.

4/20/2004 Conducted EMI filter design for 18

SMPS

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 Some References
• Laszlo Tihanyi, Electromagnetic Compatibility in Power electronics, IEEE Press, 1995
• Fu-Yuan Shih, Dan Y. Chen, A Procedure for Designing EMI filters for AC Line Applications, IEEE 1996
• Chia-Nan Chang, Hui-Kang Teng, Jun-Yuan Chen and Huang-Jen CHIU, Computerized conducted EMI
Filter Design System Using Labview and its Application

4/20/2004 Conducted EMI filter design for 19

SMPS

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