For power sources, the particular ship ‘A’ may have a gas turbine main power generator, fuel cells for energy storage, an interface for shore power (when the ship is in dock), and an auxiliary diesel power generator. For loads, ship ‘A’ may have a port propulsion motor, a starboard propulsion motor, a radar load, a sonar load, one or more pulsed loads (such as weapon systems), and a variety of ship service centers. It may be expected that all the loads for ship ‘A’ will be in use all or substantially most of the time, or that some loads may be in use only part of the time but with high power demands.

With these factors in mind, the ship-wide power converter system for ship A, and specific power converter sub-systems, may be designed with a particular power architecture (or power topology) ‘Pa-A’ of AC/DC converters, DC/AC converters, and DC/DC and/or AC/AC converters (along with inverters and other elements). The multiple various converters may be arranged and coupled ship-wide in a specific configuration, such as a radial power distribution system or a zonal power distribution system.

Research vessel ‘B’, may have a similar size and have a similar power overall/maximum consumption as ship ‘A’. However, ‘B’ has a different mission (or range of missions) as compared with ‘A’, and so is designed with different and more/fewer power sources, and with different and more/fewer loads. The overall power converter architecture ‘Pa-B’ for ship B may therefore vary dramatically from ‘Pa-A’ of ship A. Similar considerations may apply for ship C.