A novel control scheme for the multilevel rectifier/inverter

A novel three-level pulsewidth modulation (PWM) rectifier/inverter is proposed: this single-phase three-level rectifier with power factor correction and current harmonic reduction is proposed to improve power quality. A three-phase three-level neutral point clamped (NPC) inverter is adopted to reduce the harmonic content of the inverter output voltages and currents. In the adopted rectifier, a switching mode rectifier with two AC power switches is adopted to draw a sinusoidal line current in phase with mains voltage. The switching functions of the power switches are based on a look-up table. To achieve a balanced DC-link capacitor voltage, a capacitor voltage compensator is employed. In the NPC inverter, the three-level PWM techniques based on the sine-triangle PWM and space vector modulation are used to reduce the voltage harmonics and to drive an induction motor. The advantages of the adopted th-ree-level rectifier/inverter are (1) the blocking voltage of power devices (T1, T2, S_a1-S_c4) is clamped to half of the DC-link voltage, (2) low conduction loss with low conduction resistance due to low voltage stress, (3) low electromagnetic interference, and (4) low voltage harmonics in the inverter output. Based on the proposed control strategy, the rectifier can draw a high power factor line current and achieve two balance capacitor voltages. The current harmonics generated from the adopted rectifier can meet the international requirements. Finally, the proposed control algorithm is illustrated through experimental results based on the laboratory prototype.     

Three-Level Inverter Scheme With Common Mode Voltage Elimination and DC Link Capacitor Voltage Balancing for an Open-End Winding Induction Motor Drive

A dc link capacitor voltage balancing scheme along with common mode voltage elimination is proposed for an induction motor drive, with open-end winding structure. The motor is fed from both the ends with three-level inverters generating a five level output voltage space phasor structure. If switching combinations, with zero common mode voltage in the pole voltage, are used, then the resultant voltage space vector combinations are equivalent to that of a three-level inverter. The proposed inverter vector locations exhibit greater multiplicity in the inverter switching combinations which is suitably exploited to arrive at a capacitor voltage balancing scheme. This allows the use of a single dc link power supply for the combined inverter structure. The simultaneous task of common mode voltage elimination with dc link capacitor voltage balancing, using only the switching state redundancies, is experimentally verified on a 1.5-kW induction motor drive     

Fast Control of Filter for Sensorless Vector Control SQIM Drive With Sinusoidal Motor Voltage

A pulsewidth-modulated (PWM) voltage applied to a squirrel-cage induction motor (SQIM) can cause high bearing currents, heating of rotor shaft, voltage spike across the motor terminals, etc. Filtering of this PWM voltage to obtain a sinusoidal output voltage can be a solution to this problem. However, a passive L-C filter makes the dynamic performance of the drive poor for high-performance control application. In this paper, a feed-forward control strategy for the L-C filter is proposed to have a good bandwidth for the filter output voltage. This filter control strategy is introduced along with a sensorless vector control strategy for the SQIM drive. This complete strategy retains the high dynamic performance of the drive even with the L-C filter. In this paper, a three-level converter is used as a voltage source inverter for the drive to have a less filter-size requirement. The control strategy is verified on a 7.5-hp SQIM drive with a three-level insulated-gate bipolar-transistor inverter and L-C filter. Experimental results validate the high dynamic performance of the drive with filter.     

Space vector pulse width modulation of three-level inverter extending operation into overmodulation region

Multilevel voltage-fed inverters with space vector pulse width modulation have established their importance in high power high performance industrial drive applications. The paper proposes an overmodulation strategy of space vector PWM of a three-level inverter with linear transfer characteristic that easily extends from the undermodulation strategy previously developed by the authors for neural network implementation. The overmodulation strategy is very complex because of large number of inverter switching states, and hybrid in nature, that incorporates both undermodulation and overmodulation algorithms. The paper describes systematically the algorithm development, system analysis, DSP based implementation, and extensive evaluation study to validate the modulator performance. The modulator takes the command voltage and angle information at the input and generates symmetrical PWM waves for the three phases of an IGBT inverter that operates at 1.0 kHz switching frequency. The switching states are distributed such that the neutral point voltage always remains balanced. An open loop volts/Hz controlled induction motor drive has been evaluated extensively by smoothly varying the voltage and frequency in the whole speed range that covers both undermodulation and overmodulation (nearest to square-wave) regions, and performance was found to be excellent. The PWM algorithm can be easily extended to vector-controlled drive. The algorithm development is again fully compatible for implementation by a neural network.     

High efficiency, unity power factor VVVF drive system of aninduction motor

A high-efficiency, unity-power-factor VVVF (variable voltage, variable frequency) drive scheme for an induction motor is presented. A unity-power-factor PWM (pulsewidth modulated) converter regulates DC voltage. An inverter circuit with the magnetic flux control PWM method generates VVVF PWM waveforms. The modulation factor of the inverter PWM control with controllable DC link DC voltage is studied. As a result, the distortion factor and the switching frequency are reduced by over-modulation with low DC link voltage. A high-efficiency and unity-power-factor VVVF induction motor drive has been achieved using the control strategy     

A dual-bridge inverter approach to eliminating common-mode voltagesand bearing and leakage currents

This paper presents a dual-bridge inverter approach to eliminate the motor common-mode voltage and resulting bearing and leakage currents. The novel dual-bridge inverter is controlled to generate balanced excitation of the induction motor under pulsewidth modulation (PWM) inverter operation. Theoretical analysis, simulation results, and experimental results are presented to verify this concept     

An improved inverter output filter configuration reduces common anddifferential modes dv/dt at the motor terminals in PWM drivesystems

In this paper, an improved inverter output filter is proposed for pulsewidth-modulated (PWM) drive systems. The proposed filter is shown to effectively reduce both the differential and common modes dv/dt at the motor terminals, even in the presence of long motor leads. Reducing differential mode dv/dt reduces overvoltages at the motor terminals and lowers the stress on the motor insulation. Lowering common mode dv/dt is shown to significantly reduce high-frequency leakage currents to ground and induced shaft voltage in the motor. An important advantage of the approach is that the filter can be installed within the inverter enclosure to achieve both the differential and common modes dv/dt reductions at the motor terminals. Thus, the use of the filter can contribute to enhanced bearing life and improve reliability of PWM drive systems. Analysis, design equations, and experimental results on a 480-V 20-hp PWM drive system are presented. The filter configuration is an excellent candidate for many new and retrofit PWM 480-V/575-V drive systems     

A New Carrier-Based PWM Providing Common-Mode-Current Reduction and DC-Bus Balancing for Three-Level Inverters

Adjustable-speed drives involve common-mode voltages, which generate common-mode currents flowing to the ground through stray capacitances of electric machines. These currents are known to provoke premature motor-bearing failures, as well as electromagnetic interferences disturbing neighbor electronic devices. Furthermore, high-voltage applications involve high levels of these conducted emissions, which must be lowered by using bulky and expensive filters. This paper aims at elaborating a new pulsewidth-modulation (PWM) strategy in order to reduce the common-mode currents generated by three-level neutral-point-clamped inverters. The proposed strategy also provides the ability to balance the neutral point of the dc-bus capacitors. Experimental results both in time and frequency domains confirm that the new PWM improves the electromagnetic-compatibility behavior of the drive compared with conventional strategies.     

A multilevel inverter system for an induction motor with open-end windings

In this paper, a multilevel inverter system for an open-end winding induction motor drive is described. Multilevel inversion is achieved by feeding an open-end winding induction motor with two two-level inverters in cascade (equivalent to a three-level inverter) from one end and a single two-level inverter from the other end of the motor. The combined inverter system with open-end winding induction motor produces voltage space-vector locations identical to a six-level inverter. A total of 512 space-vector combinations are available in the proposed scheme, distributed over 91 space-vector locations. The proposed inverter drive scheme is capable of producing a multilevel pulsewidth-modulation (PWM) waveform for the phase voltage ranging from a two-level waveform to a six-level waveform depending on the modulation range. A space-vector PWM scheme for the proposed drive is implemented using a 1.5-kW induction motor with open-end winding structure.     

Common mode current attenuation techniques for use with PWM drives

The most common modulation strategy adopted for motor control in adjustable speed drives (ASDs) is pulse width modulation (PWM). In general, the output is modulated at a carrier frequency ranging from 1.0 kHz to 20.0 kHz. Experiences with PWM drives have shown that there exist two important concerns: (1) common mode current; and (2) over-voltage at the motor when the distance between motor and the inverter is larger than the critical distance. The high carrier frequency along with fast rise and fall time of the insulated gate bipolar transistors (IGBTs) employed results in nontrivial common-mode or ground currents. The high dv/dt causes shaft voltage, which leads to bearing currents. This phenomenon has been identified as one of the reasons for premature bearing failure in PWM driven motors. A new scheme to attenuate the common mode noise and hence reduce shaft voltage is proposed. Experimental results showing the effectiveness of the proposed solution is also presented     

On-line compensation of dead-time and inverter nonlinearity with disturbance voltage observer

This paper discusses and analyses a simple on-line compensation scheme for dead-time and inverter nonlinearity in the pulse width modulated (PWM) voltage source inverter (VSI). Dead-time effect and voltage drop in switching devices cause nonlinearity between reference and output voltage. In a conventional three-phase six-switch inverter, this nonideal condition adds extraneous harmonics that badly disturb voltage characteristics. In its turn, voltage disturbance causes distortion of the current waveform and degrades performance. In this paper, an on-line dead-time compensation method based on inverse dynamics control is proposed, and it is much simpler than conventional full/reduced order observation methods adopted in dead-time compensation. Disturbance voltages are observed on-line with no additional circuitry or off-line measurements. The observed disturbance voltages are fed back to the voltage reference for compensation. Stability problem of the proposed observer arisen from inverter delay and parameter mismatch was analysed. The proposed method is applied to a surface-mounted permanent-magnet synchronous motor (SPMSM) drive. The effectiveness of the proposed scheme is validated by the experimental results.     

An improved starting strategy for voltage-source inverter fed threephase induction motor drives under inverter fault conditions

Three phase voltage-fed inverter induction motor drives are prone to shoot through and other inverter faults that cause the drive system to shut down. The paper describes a novel strategy for restarting the drive in variable voltage variable frequency single phase mode in the presence of open base drive and shoot through fault in the inverter. The proposed method requires only the motor terminal voltages and currents to be measured. Therefore, it can be applied to even low performance open loop drives with the addition of two motor terminal voltage sensors. The starting algorithm has been verified by computer simulation and experiments on a 1 hp laboratory prototype. Experimental results are in good agreement with simulation predictions. The starting strategy described in this paper is expected to provide an economic alternative to more expensive redundancy techniques which find justification only in a few specialized applications     

Variable structure current control for induction motor drives byspace voltage vector PWM

In this paper, a variable structure current controller based on a space voltage vector PWM scheme is presented for induction motor drives. In this current controller design, only the current sensors are employed and we attempt to force the stator currents to be exactly equal to the reference currents rapidly. This proposed current controller, which is based on the space voltage vector PWM drive, exhibits several advantages in terms of reduced switching frequency, robustness to parameter variations, elimination of current/torque ripple, and improved performance in induction motor drive. It shows that the current control laws can be demonstrated in theory. Finally, simulation and experimentation results verify the proposed control scheme     

Load-Commutated SCR Current-Source-Inverter-Fed Induction Motor Drive With Sinusoidal Motor Voltage and Current

Current source inverter (CSI) is an attractive solution in high-power drives. The conventional gate turn-off thyristor (GTO) based CSI-fed induction motor drives suffer from drawbacks such as low-frequency torque pulsation, harmonic heating, and unstable operation at low-speed ranges. These drawbacks can be overcome by connecting a current-controlled voltage source inverter (VSI) across the motor terminal replacing the bulky ac capacitors. The VSI provides the harmonic currents, which results in sinusoidal motor voltage and current even with the CSI switching at fundamental frequency. This paper proposes a CSI-fed induction motor drive scheme where GTOs are replaced by thyristors in the CSI without any external circuit to assist the turning off of the thyristors. Here, the current-controlled VSI, connected in shunt, is designed to supply the volt ampere reactive requirement of the induction motor, and the CSI is made to operate in leading power factor mode such that the thyristors in the CSI are autosequentially turned off. The resulting drive will be able to feed medium-voltage, high-power induction motors directly. A sensorless vector-controlled CSI drive based on the proposed configuration is developed. The experimental results from a 5 hp prototype are presented. Experimental results show that the proposed drive has stable operation throughout the operating range of speeds.     

Improved PWM Control Strategy for Inverters and Induction Motor Drives

This paper develops a novel pulse-width modulation (PWM) strategy for application in uninterruptible power supply (UPS) and ac motor drive systems. The voltage/current harmonic spectra and other properties of this PWM scheme are thoroughly investigated. This modulation strategy is compared with other modulation techniques, especially with the commonly used sinusoidal modulation scheme, from the standpoints of simplicity, inverter switching losses, motor losses, and other output performance features. This novel modulation scheme produces an acceptable motor curent waveform while keeping the number of inverter commutations low. Implementation of this scheme is quite simple in hardware-based as well as microprocessor-based systems.     

Three Phase Three-Level PWM Switched Voltage Source Inverter With Zero Neutral Point Potential

A new three phase three-level pulsewidth modulation (PWM) switched voltage source inverter with zero neutral point potential is proposed. It consists of three single-phase inverter modules and each module is composed of a switched voltage source and inverter switches. The major advantage is that the peak value of the phase output voltage is twice as high as that of the conventional neutral-point-clamped PWM inverter. Thus, the proposed inverter is suitable for applications with low voltage sources such as batteries, fuel cells, or solar cells. Furthermore, three-level waveforms of the proposed inverter can be achieved without the switch voltage unbalance problem. Since the average neutral point potential of the proposed inverter is zero, a common ground between the input stage and the output stage is possible. Therefore, it can be applied to a transformerless power conditioning system. The proposed inverter is verified by a PSpice simulation and experimental results based on a laboratory prototype.     

A soft-switched current-controlled converter for induction machinedrives

The paper proposes a current controlled inverter operating in zero voltage switching (ZVS) mode for an induction machine drive. Operation with no voltage stress in the DC link bus is achieved. Together with the soft switching operation, a fixed frequency bang-bang current control technique is also implemented to allow for an accurate shaping of sinusoidal currents to feed the motor. As a result, a ripple free torque profile in steady state operation is achieved. With the soft switching technique it is possible to operate conventional IGBTs at 40 kHz. A detailed analysis of the circuit operation is presented. The feasibility of the proposed scheme is experimentally verified on a prototype     

Implementation of a three-level rectifier for power factorcorrection

In this paper, a new single-phase switching mode rectifier (SMR) for three-level pulse width modulation (PWM) is proposed to achieve high input power factor, low current harmonics, low total harmonic distortion (THD) and simple control scheme. The mains circuit of the proposed SMR consists of six power switches, one boost inductor, and two DC capacitors. The control algorithm is based on a look-up table. There are five control signals in the input of the look-up table. These control signals are used to control the power flow of the adopted rectifier, compensate the capacitor voltages for the balance problem, draw a sinusoidal line current with nearly unity power factor, and generate a three-level PWM pattern on the AC side of adopted rectifier. The advantages of using three-level PWM scheme compared with two-level PWM scheme are using low voltage stress of power switches, decreasing input current harmonics, and reducing the conduction losses. The performances of the proposed multilevel SMR are measured and shown in this paper. The high power factor and low harmonic currents at the input of the rectifier are verified by software simulations and experimental results from a laboratory prototype     

Implementation of a Three-Phase Capacitor-Clamped Active Power Filter Under Unbalanced Condition

A capacitor-clamped voltage-source inverter for active power filter operation under balanced and unbalanced conditions is proposed to suppress current harmonics and compensate the reactive power generated from the nonlinear loads. The adopted voltage-source inverter is based on a three-level capacitor-clamped topology to reduce the voltage stress of power semiconductors. Two control loops are used in the control scheme to achieve harmonic and reactive currents compensation and to regulate the inverter dc side voltage. In the adopted inverter, the neutral point voltage is compensated by a voltage compensator to obtain the balanced capacitor voltages on the dc side. In order to control the flying capacitor voltages, two redundant states in each inverter leg can be selected to compensate the flying capacitor to obtain a better voltage waveform with low harmonic contents on the ac terminals. The balanced and sinusoidal line currents are drawn from the ac source under the balanced and unbalanced conditions. The feasibility of the proposed scheme is confirmed through experimental results     

Trinary Hybrid 81-Level Multilevel Inverter for Motor Drive With Zero Common-Mode Voltage

This paper proposes a trinary hybrid 81-level multilevel inverter for motor drive. Benefiting from the trinary hybrid topology of the inverter, 81-level voltages per phase can be synthesized with the fewest components. Bidirectional DC-DC converters are used not only to inject power to the DC links of the inverter but also to absorb power from some DC links in cases with a lower modulation index. The higher bandwidth of DC-DC converters alleviates the ripples of DC-link voltages caused by the load current. The space vector modulation used here, which selects voltage vectors that generate a zero common-mode voltage in the load, works at a low switching frequency. With up to 81-level voltages per phase, the total harmonic distortion is small, and the relationship between the fundamental load voltage and the modulation index is precisely linear. A vector controller is used to control an induction motor, which results in a high dynamic response for speeds or torques. The performance of the proposed inverter for the motor drive is confirmed by simulation and experiment.