• Journal of Power Electronics
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• 제17권3호
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• pp.788-797
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• 2017

The power quality of AC electric railways has become an issue worthy of more and more concern. Many active compensators based on power converters have been proposed, but with complex transformers or coupled branches. This paper presents a single-phase cascaded H-bridge multilevel active power filter (APF), which can directly connect to the 27.5-kV power supplies to deal with power quality problems. According to field measured data, the load characteristics are analyzed, and the system configuration and control system are designed based on the load characteristic analysis. Finally, simulation and experimental results verify the effectiveness of the proposed APF system, considering some problems such as the supply voltage fluctuations and transient inrush currents in AC electric railway systems.

• 전력전자학회:학술대회논문집
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• 전력전자학회 2013년도 전력전자학술대회 논문집
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• pp.45-46
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• 2013

멀티레벨 고압인버터 토폴로지 중 저압 Power Cell를 이용하여 고압을 출력하는 Cascaded 방식이 산업계에서는 널리 사용되고 이다. 최근 제품화된 Cascaded 방식은 크게 두 가지 형태로 구분할 수 있다. 저압 Power Cell에 단상 H-Bridge를 이용한 Cascaded H-Bridge 멀티레벨 인버터와 단상 NPC(Neutral Point Clamped) 토폴로지를 적용한 Cascaded NPC 멀티레벨 인버터이다. 이 중 Cascaded NPC 멀티레벨 인버터의 경우 적은 수의 셀을 사용하여 CHB와 동일한 출력 레벨을 생성할 수 있으며, NPC 방식의 고압 인버터 고유의 장점을 모두 구현할 수 있다. 반대로 CHB Type과 NPC type의 단점인 복잡한 구조의 Phase Shift Transformer와 DC_Link 중성점 전압이 변동하는 단점 또한 나타나게 된다. 본 논문에서는 Cascaded NPC 멀티레벨 인버터의 이러한 단점을 극복하기 위한 새로운 방식의 Phase Shift Transformer와 NPC Power Cell의 중성점 전압 변동을 줄일 수 있는 기법에 대해 설명하고 이 기법에 대한 타당성을 모의시험을 통해 검증하였다.

• Journal of Power Electronics
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• 제17권2호
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• pp.522-532
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• 2017

This paper presents a novel integrated structure for a cascaded distribution static compensator (D-STATCOM) and distribution transformer for medium-voltage reactive power compensation. The cascaded multilevel converter is connected to a system via a group of special designed taps on the primary windings of the Dyn11 connection distribution transformer. The three-phase winding taps are symmetrically arranged and the connection point voltage can be decreased to half of the line-to-line voltage at most. Thus, the voltage stress for the D-STATCOM is reduced and a compromise between the voltage rating and the current rating can be achieved. The spare capacity of the distribution transformer can also be fully used. The working mechanism is explained in detail and a modified control strategy is proposed for reactive power compensation. Finally, both simulation and scaled-down prototype experimental results are provided to verify the feasibility and effectiveness of the proposed connection structure and control strategy.

• 대한전기학회:학술대회논문집
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• 대한전기학회 2011년도 제42회 하계학술대회
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• pp.1161-1162
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• 2011

본 논문에서는 독립된 DC 입력전원을 요구하는 Cascaded H-bridge 멀티레벨 인버터를 단일 입력전원으로 구동시키기 위한 회로 구조를 제안한다. 변압기 포화를 방지하기 위해 채용되는 리센 권선을 가지는 포워드 컨버터의 구조를 변경한 것으로 리셋 권선에 의해 전원으로 회생되는 에너지가 출력단으로 전달되도록 변경된다. 제안된 회로 구조의 입출력전압과 스위치의 도통비와의 관계를 이론적으로 분석하고 시뮬레이션을 통해 타당성을 검증한다.

• Journal of Electrical Engineering and Technology
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• 제10권2호
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• pp.574-585
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• 2015

This paper aims to improve the performance of conventional direct torque control (DTC) drives proposed by Takahashi by extending the idea for 5-level inverter. Hybrid cascaded H-bridge topology is used to achieve inverter voltage vector composed of 5-level of voltage. Although DTC is very popular for its simplicity but it suffers from some disadvantages like- high torque ripple and uncontrollable switching frequency. To compensate these shortcomings conventional DTC strategy is modified for five levels voltage source inverter (VSI). Multilevel hysteresis controller for both flux and torque is used. Optimal voltage vector selection from precise lookup table utilizing 12 sector, 9 torque level and 4 flux level is proposed to improve DTC performance. These voltage references are produced utilizing a hybrid cascaded H-bridge multilevel inverter, where inverter each phase can be realized using multiple dc source. Fuel cells, car batteries or ultra-capacitor are normally the choice of required dc source. Simulation results shows that the DTC drive performance is considerably improved in terms of lower torque and flux ripple and less THD. These have been experimentally evaluated and compared with the basic DTC developed by Takahashi.

• Journal of Power Electronics
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• 제17권1호
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• pp.76-87
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• 2017

Finite-set predictive current control (FS-PCC) is advantageous for power converters due to its high dynamic performance and has received increasing interest in multilevel inverters. Among multilevel inverter topologies, the cascaded H-bridge (CHB) inverter is popular and mature in the industry. However, a main drawback of FS-PCC is its large computational burden, especially for the application of CHB inverters. In this paper, an FS-PCC method based on a deadbeat solution for three-phase zero-common-mode-voltage CHB inverters is proposed. In the proposed method, an inverse model of the load is utilized to calculate the reference voltage based on the reference current. In addition, a cost function is directly expressed in the terms of the voltage errors. An optimal control actuation is selected by minimizing the cost function. In the proposed method, only three instead of all of the control actuations are used for the calculations in one sampling period. This leads to a significant reduction in computations. The proposed method is tested on a three-phase 5-level CHB inverter. Simulation and experimental results show a very similar and comparable control performance from the proposed method compared with the traditional FS-PCC method which evaluates the cost function for all of the control actuations.

• Journal of Power Electronics
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• 제16권6호
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• pp.2139-2149
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• 2016

In this study, a new type of cascaded modular multilevel inverters (CMMLIs) is presented which is able to produce a considerable number of output voltage levels with a reasonable number of components. Accordingly, each series stage of the proposed CMMLI is comprised of two same basic units that are connected with each other through two unidirectional power switches without aiming any of the full H-bridge cells. In addition, since the potentiality for generating a higher number of output voltage levels in CMMLIs hinges on the magnitude of the dc voltage sources used in each series unit, in the rest of this paper, four different algorithms for determining an appropriate value for the dc sources' magnitude are also presented. In the following, a comprehensive topological analysis between some CMMLI structures reported in the literature and proposed structure along with several simulation and experimental results will be also given to validate the lucrative benefits and viability of the proposed topology.

• Journal of Electrical Engineering and Technology
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• 제9권1호
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• pp.127-135
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• 2014

In this paper a novel converter structure based on cascade converter family is presented. The suggested multilevel advanced cascade converter has benefits such as reduction in number of switches and power losses. Comparison depict that proposed topology has the least number of IGBTs among all multilevel cascade type converters which have been introduced recently. This characteristic causes low cost and small installation area for suggested converter. The number of on state switches in current path is less than conventional topologies and so the output voltage drop and power losses are decreased. Symmetric and asymmetric modes are analyzed and compared with conventional multilevel cascade converter. Simulation and experimental results are presented to illustrate validity, good performance and effectiveness of the proposed configuration. The suggested converter can be applied in medium/high voltage and PV applications.

• 대한전기학회:학술대회논문집
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• 대한전기학회 2011년도 제42회 하계학술대회
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• pp.1167-1168
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• 2011

두 대의 동일한 H-bridge 모듈로 구성되는 Cascaded H-bridge 멀티레벨인버터는 출력전압에 5-레벨을 형성할 수 있으며 출력전압의 THD를 개선시키기 위해 PWM 스위칭을 적용할 수 있다. 출력필터 사이즈를 줄이기 위해 PWM 스위칭 주파수를 높일 수 있지만 스위칭 손실이 증가하게 된다. 본 논문에서는 이러한 경우 스위칭 손실을 저감시킬 수 있는 변형된 스위칭 패턴을 제안한다. Cascaded H-bridge 멀티레벨인버터의 특성을 고려하여 하단 H-bridge 모듈의 스위치는 기본 출력전압 레벨을 형성하도록 동작시키며, 상단 H-bridge 모듈 스위칭에 의한 출력값이 기본 전압레벨에 가감되어 PWM 출력전압 형성하도록 동작시킨다. 제안된 스위칭 패턴을 Cascaded H-bridge 멀티레벨인버터에 적용하여 기존 스위칭 방법과 비교 분석한다.

• Journal of Power Electronics
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• 제17권1호
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• pp.106-114
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• 2017

In this paper, the Selective Harmonic Mitigation-PWM (SHM-PWM) method is used in single-phase and three-phase Cascaded H-Bridge (CHB) inverters in order to fulfill different power quality standards such as EN 50160, CIGRE WG 36-05, IEC 61000-3-6 and IEC 61000-2-12. Non-equal DC link voltages are used to increase the degrees of freedom for the proposed SHM-PWM technique. In addition, it will be shown that the obtained solutions become continuous and without sudden changes. As a result, the look-up tables can be significantly reduced. The proposed three-phase modulation method can mitigate up to the 50th harmonic from the output voltage, while each switch has just one switching in a fundamental period. In other words, the switching frequency of the power switches are limited to 50 Hz, which is the lowest switching frequency that can be achieved in the multilevel converters, when the optimal selective harmonic mitigation method is employed. In single-phase mode, the proposed method can successfully mitigate harmonics up to the 50th, where the switching frequency is 150 Hz. Finally, the validity of the proposed method is verified by simulations and experiments on a 9-level CHB inverter.