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IEEE TRANSACTIONS ON POWER ELECTRONICS, VOL. 27, NO. 11, NOVEMBER 2012

A Dynamic Multivariable State-Space Model for

Bidirectional Inductive Power Transfer Systems
Akshya K. Swain, Member, IEEE, Michael J. Neath, Student Member, IEEE,
Udaya K. Madawala, Senior Member, IEEE, and Duleepa J. Thrimawithana, Member, IEEE

AbstractBidirectional inductive power transfer (IPT) systems

facilitate contactless power transfer between two sides, which are
separated by an air gap, through weak magnetic coupling. Typical
bidirectional IPT systems are essentially high-order resonant circuits and, therefore, difficult to both design and control without an
accurate mathematical model, which is yet to be reported. This paper presents a dynamic model, which provides an accurate insight
into the behavior of bidirectional IPT systems. The proposed statespace-based model is developed in a multivariable framework and
mapped into frequency domain to compute the transfer function
matrix of eight-order bidirectional IPT systems. The interaction
between various control variables and degree of controllability of
the system are analyzed from the relative gain array and singular
values of the system. The validity of the proposed dynamic model
is demonstrated by comparing the predicted behavior with that
measured from a 1 kW prototype bidirectional IPT system under
various operating conditions. Experimental results convincingly indicate that the proposed model accurately predicts the dynamical
behavior of bidirectional IPT systems and can, therefore, be used
as a valuable tool for transient analysis and optimum controller
design.
Index TermsContactless power transfer, inductive power
transfer, power converters, relative gain array, singular value
analysis.

I. INTRODUCTION
NDUCTIVE power transfer (IPT) is becoming an accepted
technology for supplying power to a variety of applications
with no physical contacts. This technology transfers power from
one system to another across an air gap and through weak magnetic coupling. It offers high efficiency typically between 85
90%, robustness, and high reliability, even when used in hostile
environments, because it is unaffected by dust or chemicals. In
the past, many unidirectional IPT systems, with various circuit
topologies or compensation strategies and levels of sophistication in control, have been proposed and successfully implemented to cater to a wide spectrum of applications, ranging
from very low-power biomedical implants to high-power battery
charging systems [1][7]. Recently, bidirectional IPT systems
have also been proposed and developed for applications such as
V2G systems [8], [9].

Manuscript received September 12, 2011; revised December 18, 2011;

accepted January 16, 2012. Date of current version June 20, 2012. Recommended for publication by Associate Editor C. R. Sullivan.
The authors are with the Department of Electrical and Computer Engineering, The University of Auckland, Auckland-1142, New Zealand (e-mail:
a.swain@auckland.ac.nz).
Color versions of one or more of the figures in this paper are available online
at http://ieeexplore.ieee.org.
Digital Object Identifier 10.1109/TPEL.2012.2185712

The power handling capability of IPT systems is usually improved through either series or parallel compensations [10]. As a
consequence, these systems invariably become high-order resonant networks, which are complex in nature and difficult to both
design and analyze, especially when operated at frequencies in
the range of 1050 kHz. Although the IPT technology has now
established itself as a technique for contactless power transfer,
both the design and analyses of such systems are still being
carried out only through relatively simple steady-state models
mainly because of their complex nature [11][17]. Steady-state
models are incapable of providing an accurate insight into the
dynamic behavior of the system and, as such, cannot be regarded as a tool that facilitates both proper controller synthesis
and physical design, without which the system cannot be optimized. At present, therefore, there is a need for an accurate
dynamic model, which can be used as a valuable tool during the
design stage of any IPT system.
To address this need, this paper proposes a dynamic model
for bidirectional IPT systems. The proposed model is based on
the concept of state variables, and can easily be modified for
unidirectional IPT systems. Using the model, the relative gain
array (RGA) matrix is computed from the transfer function to
investigate the interactions between various inputoutputs of
an eight-order parallel-compensated IPT system. Singular value
analysis is also carried out to obtain information with regard to
the degree of controllability of the system as such information
is vital for controller design. Measured results, under various
operation conditions of a 1 kW bidirectional IPT system, are
compared with the predicted behavior to demonstrate that the
proposed dynamic model is accurate and can be used as a valuable tool during controller synthesis and optimization of IPT
systems.
This paper is organized as follows. Section II briefly describes
the principle of bidirectional IPT system and develops a state
variable model of the system. Behavior of the system from frequency domain information is studied in Section-III A through
RGA and singular value analysis. In Section IV, the dynamic
model is validated by comparing its performance under various
conditions using a prototype of a 1 kW bidirectional IPT system
and Section V presents the conclusions.
II. DYNAMIC STATE VARIABLE MODEL OF A TYPICAL
BIDIRECTIONAL IPT SYSTEM
The schematic of a typical bidirectional IPT system proposed
in [8] is shown in Fig. 1. The output of the pick-up is connected to the load, which is represented as a dc supply to either
absorb or deliver power. Analogous to typical IPT systems, a

0885-8993/$31.00 2012 IEEE

SWAIN et al.: DYNAMIC MULTIVARIABLE STATE-SPACE MODEL FOR BIDIRECTIONAL INDUCTIVE POWER TRANSFER SYSTEMS

Fig. 1.

Fig. 2.

4773

Bidirectional IPT system.

Equivalent circuit representation of bidirectional IPT system.

primary supply generates a constant track current iT (t) in LT ,

which is magnetically coupled to the pick-up coil. The primary
and pick-up circuits are implemented with virtually identical
electronics, which include a reversible rectifier and a tuned (resonant) inductorcapacitorinductor (LCL) circuit, to facilitate
bidirectional power flow between the track and the pick-up.
Each LCL circuit is tuned to the track frequency, generated by
the primary supply, and each reversible rectifier is operated at
the same track frequency either in the inverting or rectifying
mode, depending on the direction of the power flow. The magnitude and phase the voltages applied to the reversible rectifiers
will determine the amount and direction of power flow.
The primary and pick-up system can, thus, be represented by
the circuit model shown in Fig. 2. The instantaneous value of
the induced voltage vsi (t) of the pick-up coil Lsi due to track
current iT (t) is given by

where
current through the primary side inductor Lpi ;
ipi
vcpi voltage across the primary input capacitor Cpi ;
vpt voltage across primary side capacitor CT ;
current through track inductor LT ;
iT
iso current through the pick-up side inductor Lso ;
vcso voltage across the pick-up output capacitor Cso ;
vst voltage across the pick-up side capacitor Cs ;
current through the pick-up side inductor Lsi .
isi
Let the input vector u be denoted as follows:
u = [ u1

x 2 =

diT (t)
(1)
dt
where M represents the magnetic coupling or mutual inductance
between the track inductance LT and pick-up coil inductance
Lsi .
The pick-up, the output of which is connected to the load,
may be operated either as a source or a sink by the pick-up side
reversible rectifier. Despite the mode of operation, the instantaneous value of the voltage vr (t) reflected back into the track
due to current isi (t), in the pick-up coil can be expressed by
disi (t)
.
dt

= [ ipi

x2
vcpi

1
x1
Cpi

1
1
x1
x4
CT
CT


1
RT
x 4 =
x3
x4 x7 Rsi x8
LT
LT
Rso
1
1
1
x5
x6 +
x7
u2
Lso
Lso
Lso
Lso
1
x 6 =
x5
Cso
1
1
x 7 = x5 +
x8
Cs
Cs


1
Rsi
x 8 = x3 RT x4
x7
x8
Lsi
Lsi
x 5 =

(4)

where

The dynamic model of this circuit is developed by introducing

the state variables
x = [ x1

(3)

x 3 =

(2)

A. Dynamic Model

vso ]T

where u1 = vpi = input voltage applied at the primary side.

Note that this voltage is essentially the output voltage of the
primary side converter and u2 = vso = voltage at the pick-up
side.
Following the basic principles of circuit theory, the dynamic
model can be expressed by the following eight differential equations:
Rpi
1
1
1
x1
x2
x3 +
u1
x 1 =
Lpi
Lpi
Lpi
Lpi

vsi (t) = M

vr (t) = M

u2 ]T = [ vpi

x3
vpt

x4
iT

x5
iso

x6

x7
vcso

x8 ]T
vst

M
,
Lsi LT

1
.
1 M

(5)

This can be expressed in the standard state space form as follows:

T

isi ]

x = Ax + Bu

(6)

4774

IEEE TRANSACTIONS ON POWER ELECTRONICS, VOL. 27, NO. 11, NOVEMBER 2012

where the system matrix A is given by

R
1
1
pi

0
Lpi
Lpi
Lpi

1
0
0
0

Cpi

1
1

0
0

CT
C
T

RT

0
0

LT
LT
A=

0
0
0
0

0
0
0
0

0
0
0
0

RT

1
Lso

1
Lso

Lsi

0
0
0
0

Rso
Lso

1
Cso

1
Cs

Fig. 3.

0
0

Rsi

Cs

Rsi

Lsi

systems. Since the frequency response functions, RGA, and singular values convey important information about the physical
behavior of the system, these are computed and analyzed in the
following section.

(7)

and the input matrix B is given by

1
T
0 0 0
0
0 0 0
Lpi

.
B=
(8)

1
0
0 0 0
0 0 0
Lso
Considering the track current iT = x4 and pick-up current
iso = x5 as outputs, the output equation can be written as
y = Cx

(9)

where
y = [ y1 y2 ]T = [ iT iso ]T

0 0 0 1 0 0 0
C=
0 0 0 0 1 0 0

0
0


.

Magnitude plots of system transfer function matrix.

(10)

The output power is obtained by multiplying the voltage VDC 2

with the rectified pick-up output current iso . Since VDC2 is kept
constant at VDC , the output power is controlled by controlling
the current iso . This will be explained in Section IV.
After getting the state-space model of the bidirectional system, analysis is carried out using standard tools of multivariable

III. FREQUENCY DOMAIN ANALYSIS FROM THE TRANSFER

FUNCTION MATRIX
The transfer function matrix G of the bidirectional IPT system
is computed from the system model given in (4) and is expressed
as follows:


G11 (s) G12 (s)
Y (s)
1
= C(sI A) B =
G(s) =
U (s)
G21 (s) G22 (s)
(11)
where
G11 (s) =

IT (s)
IT (s)
Iso (s)
, G12 (s) =
, G21 (s) =
Vpi (s)
Vso (s)
Vpi (s)

G22 (s) =

Iso (s)
.
Vso (s)

(12)

The magnitude and phase plots of each element of the transfer

function matrix are computed for the parameters given in Table I
and are shown, respectively, in Figs. 3 and 4.
From the magnitude plots of G12 (s) and G21 (s), shown in
Fig. 3, it is observed that there exists significant coupling between the primary and secondary sides of the bidirectional IPT
system. Furthermore, it is observed that peaks in the various
gains of the transfer function matrix occur at the same frequencies. At these frequencies, behavior of the bidirectional IPT
system changes from inductive to capacitive or capacitive to
inductive as reflected in the phase response of the system. The
effective impendence seen by the source at these frequencies is
minimum, which causes excessive current to flow in the circuit.
The losses in the system will be very high around these frequencies and operation of the system should, therefore, be avoided
at these frequencies.

SWAIN et al.: DYNAMIC MULTIVARIABLE STATE-SPACE MODEL FOR BIDIRECTIONAL INDUCTIVE POWER TRANSFER SYSTEMS

Fig. 4.

Phase plots of system transfer function matrix.

Fig. 5. RGA of the bidirectional pick-up. Real parts of

been plotted.

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1 1 and 1 2 have

A. Relative Gain Array of Bidirectional IPT System

The RGA, introduced in [18], is a heuristic method to predict
the degree of coupling or interaction in a multivariable system. If
uj and yi denote a particular inputoutput pair of a multivariable
system with transfer function matrix G(s), then the relative gain
ij between input j and output i is defined as follows:


ij =

yi
uj

yi
uj

u k ,k = j

(13)

y k ,k = i

where ( uy ij )u k ,k = j is the gain between input j and output i

with all other loops open and ( uy ij )y k ,k = i is the gain between
input j and output i with all other loops closed. The RGA of
a nonsingular complex square matrix G is a square complex
matrix, which is given by [19]
RGA(G) = (G) = G (G1 )T .

(14)

The different elements of the RGA matrix can provide important intuitive information about the system. For example,
if RGA(i, i) = 1, there is no interaction with other inputs; if
RGA(i, j) = 0, the manipulated input i does not affect the output j; and RGA(i, j) = 0.5 implies a high degree of interaction.
Further, if RGA(i, j) > 1, this implies that this interaction reduces the effective gain of the control loop and if RGA(i, j) < 0,
this shows that closing the loop will change the sign of the effective gain and should be avoided, if possible. More details about
interpreting the RGA elements can be found in [19].
Note that RGA is a function of frequency. Furthermore, the
sum of elements of each column or each row of the RGA matrix
is 1. Therefore, for a 2 2 system, only one element of the RGA
for a given frequency is calculated to find the entire RGA. This
is denoted by
 


1 11
11
11 12
=
.
(15)
=
21 22
1 11
11

For the bidirectional pick-up considered, the RGA is computed

over a wide frequency range and is shown in Fig. 5. When the
pick-up is operated at a frequency of 20 kHz, the relative gain
array is given by

=

1.0931 0.0033i

0.0931 + 0.0033i

0.0931 + 0.0033i

1.0931 0.0033i


.

(16)

The RGA elements 11 and 22 at 20 kHz are close to 1. This

indicates that there exists a strong interaction between y1 and
u1 and between y2 and u2 . Therefore, the variable y2 , which
represents the current iso in the pick-up, can easily be controlled
by controlling u2 . Since the other RGA elements 12 and 21
are negative, the variables y1 should not be controlled or paired
with u2 , and y2 should not be paired or controlled using u1 . This
observation from the model confirms the physical understanding
of the system. For example, if the output current iso i.e., y2 is
controlled using the input voltage vpi i.e., u1 , the primary track
current iT becomes lower at lower values of input voltage vpi ,
i.e., u1 . This causes the induced voltage vsi in the pick-up coil
to be low. To maintain the same output voltage vso , the pick-up
needs to operate at high Q-values. This is often undesirable and
may make the system unstable.
B. Singular Value Analysis of Bidirectional IPT System
The eigenvalues of a transfer function matrix, denoted as
i (G(j)), do not provide any meaningful information unlike
the eigenvalues of single input single output (SISO) system.
One of the most useful parameters for analyzing a multiple input multiple output (MIMO) system is its singular values and
the condition number [20]. The singular values are the positive square roots of the eigenvalues of GH G, where GH is the
complex conjugate transpose of G and is denoted as

(17)
i (G) = (GH G).

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IEEE TRANSACTIONS ON POWER ELECTRONICS, VOL. 27, NO. 11, NOVEMBER 2012

Fig. 7.

Experimental prototype of bidirectional IPT system.

Fig. 6. Maximum and minimum singular values and condition number of

bidirectional pick-up within 25% of nominal operating frequency of 20 kHz.

The singular values are functions of the frequency. The condition number of a system is a measure of inputoutput
controllability of a system and is defined as the ratio between
the maximum and minimum singular values. This is expressed
as
(G) =

(G)
.
(G)

(18)

where (G) and (G) are, respectively, the maximum and minimum singular value of the system. The plots of singular values
and the condition number over 25% of the normal operating
frequency of 20 kHz is shown in Fig. 6. The condition number
of the system at 20 kHz is 12.76, which indicates that control
of this system at this frequency is not trivial. However, if the
operating frequency deviates from 20 kHz, the condition number increases sharply, which indicates that the control of the
system will become increasingly difficult at other frequencies.
This confirms the physical understanding of the system.
IV. EXPERIMENTAL VALIDATION OF MODEL
In order to verify that the developed state-space model is
correct, a 1 kW bidirectional IPT system prototype shown, in
Fig. 7, was built as a benchmark. The various parameters of the
prototype are given in Table I.
A. Model Validation in Frequency Domain
During the first phase, the model is validated in frequency
domain. Since the bidirectional system is usually tuned to operate at a particular frequency, which is 20 kHz in this particular
case, it is essential to understand the frequency domain behavior
around this frequency. The frequency response functions of the
system were measured in the frequency range of 1525 kHz,
which is 25% of the nominal frequency of 20 kHz, and were
compared with those computed from the model and shown in

Fig. 8. Comparison of magnitudes of frequency response functions computed

from the model and observed through experiment within 25% of the nominal
frequency of 20 kHz. The denotes the experimental observation.

Fig. 8. From Fig. 8, it is observed that the magnitude plots of

G11 and G21 match satisfactorily with the experimentally observed response. However, there are some discrepancies in the
magnitude plots of G12 and G22 at a specific frequency range
where the magnitude of the frequency response functions are
very small. This is expected because of the possible inaccuracies in the measurement process at such lower scale.
B. Model Validation by Comparing Power
Regulation Performance
The next phase of validation is carried out by comparing the
power regulation performance of both the dynamic model and
the experimental prototype. Note that the amount of bidirectional power flow can be controlled either by phase or voltage
modulation. However, in this study, simple proportional and
integral (PI) controller, which exists in the prototype, has been
used to control the voltage on pick-up side at unity power factor,
which alternately controls both the magnitude and direction of
power flow. The basic principle of the method is briefly stated

SWAIN et al.: DYNAMIC MULTIVARIABLE STATE-SPACE MODEL FOR BIDIRECTIONAL INDUCTIVE POWER TRANSFER SYSTEMS

Fig. 9.

4777

Simplified pick-up control strategy for bidirectional IPT system.

for sake of completeness. If the proposed model is accurate, the

results of current/power regulation using both should exactly be
similar.
With voltage control, the pick-up side voltage is generated
either at 90 phase angle with respect to the primary voltage.
A lagging or leading 90 phase angle dictates whether the power
flow is from pick-up side to the primary side or from primary
side to the pick-up side. Note that this phase lag is in addition
to the 90 that is required for the usual square-wave operation.
The primary converter is driven as a square-wave voltage to
generate a constant voltage and keep the track current constant
for all loads. The voltage generated by the pick-up side converter
is regulated as desired by driving both legs of the full bridge
with respect to each other using a phase shift s . A zero phase
shift generates a square-wave voltage of the maximum possible
voltage of the converter whereas 180 phase shift creates a short
circuit, giving a zero voltage as in the case of typical IPT control.
As the phase shift changes, the effective output current changes,
and thus for a given output voltage, the power output can be
regulated by varying the phase shift s .
1) Procedure for Model-Based PI Controller Design: The
bidirectional IPT system is a MIMO system and before designing a fully interacting multivariable controller, it is useful to check on whether a completely decentralized design can
achieve the desired performance. From the RGA analysis of the
IPT system carried out in Section III-A, it was observed that
a controller can be designed using a decentralized approach.
A simplified block diagram, illustrating the control strategy, is
shown in Fig. 9, where the desired power Pref is compared with
the measured power Ps and the error is fed to a PI controller with
a limiter to yield the required phase angle for modulating the
output voltage vso (t) = u2 (t). The change in vso (t) changes the
effective output current iso (t) and thereby regulates the output
power. The output of the PI controller is expressed as

u(t) = Kp

1
e(t) +
Ti

e( )d

(19)

where Kp and Ti are, respectively, the proportional gain and

integral time of the controller. Many tuning rules for PI and
PID controllers utilizing different methodologies have been
proposed in the literature. [21]. In this study, these gains are
determined using the ZieglerNichols method, which requires
knowledge about the ultimate gain and ultimate frequency of
the system. The steps for designing PI controller are as follows.
1) From the Bode or Nyquist plot of G22 (s), determine the
gain margin (GM), phase margin (PM), phase cross over
frequency GM , and the gain cross over frequency PM .

Fig. 10. Primary input voltage v p i , track current iT , phase modulated pick-up
voltage v s o , and pick-up output current is o are shown. Controller output s
and power output p s during power flow in forward direction obtained from the
dynamic model under high-power condition.

2) Determine the ultimate gain Ku and ultimate period Tu

from
2
Ku = GM, Tu =
.
(20)
GM
3) Compute the proportional gain Kp and the integral time
Ti from
Tu
.
(21)
1.2
For the system considered here, the value of the gain parameters become Kp = 0.067 and Ti = 27.07 s. The transient
response of the system with this choice of controller parameter
results in a 45% overshoot. Note that the tuning rules proposed
by ZieglerNichols give a rough estimate of the controller gains
and these need to be adjusted to get better quality of response.
The proportional gain Kp was, therefore, decreased by 1.5 times
and both the simulation and experiments were performed with
Kp = 0.0447 and Ti = 27.07 s that results in less than 5% of
overshoot.
2) Results and Discussion: The primary side converter of
the system, supplied by a 150 V dc supply, was controlled to
produce a 150 V square-wave voltage and maintain a constant
track current of approximately 40 A at 20 kHz. The pick-up was
magnetically coupled to the track to either extract power from
the track or deliver power back to the track. The pick-up side
converter or reversible rectifier was connected to a 150 V dc
source, and was driven with a phase shift to produce the desired
voltage of the pick-up side converter and regulate the output
power.
Figs. 10 and 11 show, respectively, the results from the model
and the prototype when delivering 1 kW to the pick-up. The
first and second plots of both Figs. 10 and 11 shows the voltages
and currents of the primary and pick-up. From these plots, it is
evident that the pick-up side converter generates a voltage Vso ,
which is lagging the voltage Vpi generated by the primary side
converter. In this situation, the primary side converter operates in
the inverter mode to deliver power to the pick-up side converter,
Kp = 0.45Ku ,

Ti =

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IEEE TRANSACTIONS ON POWER ELECTRONICS, VOL. 27, NO. 11, NOVEMBER 2012

Fig. 11. Primary input voltage v p i , track current iT , phase modulated pick-up
voltage v s o , and pick-up output current is o are shown. Controller output s
and power output p s during power flow in forward direction obtained from the
experimental prototype under high-power condition.

Fig. 12. Primary input voltage v p i , track current iT , phase modulated pick-up
voltage v s o , and pick-up output current is o are shown. Controller output s
and power output p s during power flow in reverse direction obtained from the
dynamic model under high-power condition.

which operates in the rectifier mode. Further, from the plot of

Vso , it is observed that the pick-up side converter operates with
a phase shift, and hence generates a square wave voltage whose
value is less than the maximum possible value of 150 V. The
third and fourth plots of both Figs. 10 and 11 show the controller
output and the power output of the pick-up. It is observed that
the system exhibits satisfactory transient response with less than
5% overshoot and settling time of 400 s.
The effects of changing the direction of power flow on the
voltages and currents under high-power flow conditions are
shown in Figs. 12 and 13. From the first and second plots of
Figs. 12 and 13, it is evident that the pick-up side converter
generates a voltage Vso , which is leading, instead of lagging the
voltage Vpi generated by the primary side converter, as in the
case of power flow in forward direction. In this situation, the
primary side converter operates in the rectifier mode to receive
power from the pick-up side converter. Further, the transient

Fig. 13. Primary input voltage v p i , track current iT , phase modulated pickup voltage v s o , and pick-up output current is o are shown. Controller output s
and power output p s during power flow in reverse direction obtained from the
experimental prototype under high-power condition.

Fig. 14. Effects of variation in coupling between the primary and the pick-up
by 31.25% in forward direction obtained from the dynamic model.

response of the system is quite satisfactory as is evident from

the fourth plot of both the figures.
After validating the model under high-power conditions at
1 kW, experiments were conducted under low-power conditions
at 650 W in both the forward and reverse directions and the results were compared with those obtained from the model. It was
observed that the results from the model and the prototype are
in good agreement with each other. However, the results under
low-power conditions are not shown here due to limitations of
space.
3) Effects of Variation of Coupling and Primary Tuning
Capacitance: To further demonstrate that the model is accurate,
the mutual inductance between the primary and the pick-up was
varied over a wide range. The power regulation performance of
both the model and the experimental prototype when the mutual
inductance was changed from 8.0 to 5.5 H, which amounts to a
change of 31.25%, is shown in Figs. 14 and 15, respectively. The
results of power regulation as well as the output of the controller
are shown in Figs. 14 and 15 for forward directions of power
flow. The results in the reverse direction of power flow are very

SWAIN et al.: DYNAMIC MULTIVARIABLE STATE-SPACE MODEL FOR BIDIRECTIONAL INDUCTIVE POWER TRANSFER SYSTEMS

Fig. 15. Effects of variation in coupling between the primary and the pick-up
by 31.25% in forward direction obtained from the experimental prototype.

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Fig. 17. Effects of variation of primary tuning capacitance C T obtained from

the experimental prototype.

results collected from a prototype of a 1 kW bidirectional IPT

system, which was operated under various conditions. First, the
frequency response functions were computed from the model
and compared with the experimentally observed frequency response, and they show a satisfactory match. Second, the control
performance of the model in both forward and reverse directions of power flow, under various conditions, such as high- and
low-power, variations of magnetic coupling, and primary tuning
capacitance, were compared with the performance of the experimental prototype. Results of the investigation demonstrated that
the proposed model can accurately predict the behavior of bidirectional IPT system and can be used for design and control of
IPT systems.
TABLE I
PARAMETERS OF PROTOTYPE BIDIRECTIONAL IPT SYSTEM
Fig. 16. Effects of variation of primary tuning capacitance C T obtained from
the dynamic model.

similar, which are not given due to limitations of space. The

results shows the performance obtained from the model and the
prototype agree closely, and therefore, the model is an accurate
representation of the system.
During the last phase of this research, the value of the primary
tuning capacitor CT was changed over a wide range. The results
of regulation for power flow in forward direction with a 18%
change in capacitance is shown in Figs. 16 and 17. The results in
the reverse power flow condition is similar. Note that the effects
of changing the mutual inductance and the capacitor are studied
under high-power condition.
V. CONCLUSION
A dynamic model has been developed for an eight-order bidirectional IPT system using state variables. This model is an ideal
tool for both steady state and transient analysis of IPT systems
as well as for the design of controllers. Model-based analysis
of the system was carried out using RGA and singular values
and the results obtained from this analysis confirm the physical
behavior of the system. The accuracy of the proposed model is
validated by comparing its performance with the experimental

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Akshya K. Swain (M97) received the B.Sc. Engineering degree in electrical engineering and the M.Sc.
Engineering degree in electronic systems and communication from Sambalpur University, Sambalpur,
India, in 1985 and 1988, respectively. From 1994 to
1996, he was a Commonwealth Scholar in the United
Kingdom and received the Ph.D. degree from the
Department of Automatic Control and Systems Engineering, University of Sheffield, Sheffield, U.K., in
1997.
From 1986 to 2002, he was a Lecturer, an Assistant
Professor, and a Professor of electrical engineering in the National Institute of
Technology, Rourkela, India. During 19881989, he was an Assistant Director
in the Ministry of Energy for the Indian government. Since September 2002,
he has been with the Department of Electrical and Computer Engineering, The
University of Auckland, Auckland, New Zealand. His research interests include
nonlinear system identification and control, biomedical signal processing, sensor networks, and control applications to power system and inductive power
transfer systems.
Dr. Swain acts as a member of the Editorial Board of the International Journal of Automation and Control and International Journal of Sensors, Wireless
Communications and Control.

Michael J. Neath (S08) received the B.E. degree

(Hons) in electrical engineering from The University
of Auckland, Auckland, New Zealand, in 2011, where
he is currently working toward the Ph.D. degree in
power electronics.
His research interests include the fields of power
electronics, inductive power transfer, wireless electric
vehicle charging, and vehicle to grid systems.

Udaya K. Madawala (M93SM06) received

the B.Sc. degree (Hons.) in electrical engineering from The University of Moratuwa, Moratuwa,
Sri Lanka, in 1987, and the Ph.D. degree
in power electronics from The University of
Auckland, Auckland, New Zealand, in 1993.
After working in industry, he joined the Department of Electrical and Computer Engineering, The
University of Auckland, in 1997, where he is currently an Associate Professor. He is also a Consultant to the industry. His research interests include the
fields of power electronics, inductive power transfer and renewable energy.
Dr. Madawala is an active IEEE volunteer and serves as an Associate Editor
for both IEEE TRANSACTIONS ON INDUSTRIAL ELECTRONICS AND IEEE TRANSACTIONS ON POWER ELECTRONICS. He is a member of the Power Electronics
Technical Committee and also Chairman of the Joint Chapter of IEEE Industrial Electronics Society and Industrial Applications Society in New Zealand
(North).

Duleepa J. Thrimawithana (M09) received the

B.E. degree (Hons.) in electrical engineering and the
Ph.D. degree in power electronics, from The University of Auckland, Auckland, New Zealand, in 2005,
and 2009, respectively.
From 2005 to 2008, he was a Research Engineer in
the areas of power converter and high voltage pulse
generator design in collaboration with the Tru-Test
Ltd., Auckland, New Zealand. In 2008, he joined the
Department of Electrical and Computer Engineering,
University of Auckland, as a Part-Time Lecturer. During this time, he was involved in modeling of microgrids and vehicle to grid
interface systems in collaboration with the Department of Energy Technology,
Aalborg University, Aalborg, Denmark. He is currently a full-time Lecturer and
a Research Fellow in the Department of Electrical and Computer Engineering,
University of Auckland. His main research interests include the fields of inductive power transfer systems and power electronic converters that are suitable for
green energy applications.