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On these pages we try to provide answers to the question of what Electromagnetic Power Technology stands for, what it is, where and why you can apply it and what you can achieve with it. EMVT stands for electromagnetic power technology, a name that in itself does not reveal the full meaning of this technology. Electromagnetism is central, but when it comes to power one should not only think of high power, but especially of high power density. First, some definitions as used by the experts...

Definitions
EMVT includes the multidisciplinary knowledge and resources to ensure the transport and conversion of electrical energy in the desired form and in the desired time. EMVT involves a material realization of electromagnetic fields specified in space and time (EMVT Initiative Group, Van Kampen, 1995).

EMVT is engaged in activities - from fundamental research to product development - in the multidisciplinary field of electromagnetic systems that are characterized by high power, high frequency and high efficiency. The electrical, magnetic, thermal and mechanical aspects are approached integrally (definition of the EMVT Association).

Electromagnetic power technology is the technology that concerns the design, generation, control and use of electromagnetic fields in space and time (definition Stroomversnelling, STT, 1999).

A piece of history
Although electricity as a phenomenon has been known since the ancient Greeks, structural research into electrical and, initially separately, magnetic phenomena only started in the second half of the 18th century. Experimenters such as Coulomb, Galvani and Volta have investigated and described electromagnetism as a physical phenomenon. In the first half of the 19th century, this research was continued by researchers with names that are now well-known in electrical engineering such as Ohm, Ampere, Weber, Gauss and Faraday. It was the great achievement of James Clark Maxwell to describe the connection between the hitherto separate physical phenomena of electricity and magnetism in a particularly elegant system of mathematical equations. Maxwell published his findings in 1873 in his Treatise on Electricity and Magnetism. Now, more than 130 years later, this work is still seen as the most important theoretical basis of electrical theory.

The second half of the 19th century saw the development of electrical components, products and systems that have now deeply penetrated our daily lives. Mentioned are the telephone, the light bulb, the electric motor, electric generator and components such as a transformer and electron tube (diode and triode). Important names behind these products are Bell, Edison, Lee de Forest and Tesla. These products gave an enormous boost to the development of public telephony and telegraphy, public electricity supply, radio, radar and later television. Although the foundations of many applications were already laid in the 19th century, developments only really started in the 20th century. The development of the transistor around 1950 and the first integrated circuit (IC) 10 years later led to an acceleration of developments and a miniaturization and price reduction of products. The IC in particular has largely facilitated the creation of a completely new discipline, information technology.

The physicist becomes an engineer
It is striking that from about the middle of the 19th century, i.e. approximately from the moment Maxwell wrote his famous equations, there has been a change in the approach to the study of electricity and electromagnetism. While before that time attention was mainly focused on the physical and theoretical aspects, researchers from, say roughly the Edison generation and later, focused much more on practical applications. The practical elaboration of this took shape in the form of networks, on a small scale, for example the electrical circuit in a device, or on a large scale, for example the electricity network.

It is important to realize that the development of network theory that this initiated made it possible to break away, as it were, from the physical foundations on which the operation of components and devices is based. The development of practical applications was therefore the domain of the engineer and no longer of the physicist. Components that have complex properties in a strictly physical sense could, for most practical applications, be reduced to elements with a single electrical property that can easily be described mathematically. A coil is an element with a self-inductance and to a first approximation no resistance or internal or external capacitance and the electromagnetic field is considered to be concentrated only in the component, without external influences. A wire is a 'component' with zero resistance, without inductance or capacitance.

Development of network theory
In this approach, which has led to the countless applications we know today, the geometry of the components and the electrical circuits that are realized with them plays no role and there are many degrees of freedom for the designers. We now realize that this is only true under conditions that are not too extreme, i.e. when frequencies are sufficiently low, the voltages and currents are not too large and the physical dimensions compared to the smallest wavelength are large enough. Situations that apparently occur frequently.

Designers of high-frequency circuits know that they must take geometries into account, that a coil cannot be characterized exclusively by an inductance and that a wire can indeed have a significant inductance and cause a field. EMC experts know that in a system with an apparently low operating frequency, parasitic phenomena occur that certainly require attention to the geometry of a circuit and to the presence and influence of fields. The knowledge underlying this is often empirical in nature and the development of models on the basis of which predictions of such 'parasitic' behavior can be made is still in its infancy.

Although we are reaching the limits of network theory, its application, combined with empirically acquired skills, remains the most important basis for the development of electrical products and systems to this day. The development of new, particularly semiconductor, components has also been of great importance. With regard to network theory, it can safely be said that both the analysis element (calculating the properties and behavior of a given circuit) and the synthesis element (designing a circuit that has certain desired properties) are highly developed.

More compact, lighter, more complex, faster, more efficient
The general trend in technological development is towards products and systems that become more compact, lighter and more efficient with greater functionality, higher complexity and greater processing speed. Stricter efficiency requirements are also imposed for economic and environmental reasons. In addition, technological developments make completely new applications possible. Examples of this are also widely available for electrical products.

For electrical products and systems, this means that the dimensions become smaller, which increases the energy and power density. Increasingly, use will have to be made of advanced control electronics and signal processing techniques with high internal switching and processing speeds. At higher energy levels, designers are confronted with traditionally conflicting design requirements. In classical electrical energy technology, high power can be switched with a high efficiency, but only at a low speed (traditionally 50-60 Hz). In information technology, a large bandwidth is important, but the signal power remains limited and therefore the return is less significant. Switching large powers at high speed (bandwidth) and high efficiency is accompanied by mechanical forces and thermal phenomena that must be taken into account in the design process. In addition, stricter requirements are imposed on the physical properties of materials, both conductors and insulators and semiconductors.

The principles and preconditions for applying the network theory appear to no longer apply, so that one will have to fall back on the underlying more fundamental physical theory. This places greater demands on designers and design processes. When developing new innovative electrical products that are characterized by compactness, higher power density, greater processing speeds and higher efficiency, traditional design methods and available components and materials can no longer be used, but more fundamental design processes must be applied and will have to be made of new or newly developed materials and components.

ElectroMagnetic Power Technology (EMVT) offers a solution

It has been stated above that the development of electrical engineering applications is largely due to the simplifications that have become possible through the application of network theory. This made it unnecessary to apply the Maxwell equations when calculating a simple electrical circuit. The installer of electrical installations will be grateful for this. Apart from the fact that a very fundamental approach was often not necessary, in many cases it would also not have been possible because the knowledge, techniques and resources were not available. This situation has now changed drastically and both the mathematical methods and supporting resources such as computers to 'calculate' Maxwell have been significantly improved and new materials and components such as power semiconductors have become available. The coincidence in time of the need for a more fundamental approach to the development of electrical engineering systems on the one hand and its availability on the other hand has laid the foundation for the development of a completely new discipline, namely Electromagnetic Power Technology (EMVT).

Innovation of product, process and application

EMVT has several faces. On the one hand, it is the scientific discipline, or rather the combination of disciplines, that makes it possible to improve existing electrical engineering products through the application of integrated design processes and an uncompromising application of fundamental physical principles. In addition, thinking in networks - which has yielded undeniable advantages in many situations - must be changed into thinking in space and time. In addition, EMVT enables better control of processes because a fundamental insight into physical processes and the use of better models and simulation methods enable a 'first time right' design. Design processes become shorter, intermediate steps become redundant and better use is made of the physical properties of the materials used. Finally, the application of EMVT opens the way to completely new applications as a result of the improved methods for dimensioning electric, magnetic and electromagnetic fields in the desired manner (field synthesis).

SUMMARIZING

The above shows that applying the knowledge and skills arising from managing EMVT as a multidisciplinary field does not offer the easiest way to develop an electrical product or process. However, it does offer the challenging opportunity to be active in a groundbreaking, innovative and therefore competitive manner on the market.