• Journal of the Korean Institute of Illuminating and Electrical Installation Engineers
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• v.29 no.9
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• pp.71-80
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• 2015

This paper proposes a convenient thermal modeling method for loss distribution control method of 3-level Active NPC(Neutral Point Clamped) inverter. In the drawback of conventional 3-level NPC, the generated losses can occur unbalance in each switching device, as a result, thermal utilization of designed system has been decreased. In order to compensate unbalanced losses, Active NPC inverter performed loss balancing control with thermal modeling during operation of each switching device. Therefore, this paper deals with a convenient thermal modeling method based on newton's law of cooling rather than conventional thermal modeling method. Both simulation and experimental results based on 10kW 3-level Active NPC inverter confirm the validity of the analysis performed in the study.

• The Transactions of the Korean Institute of Power Electronics
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• v.28 no.1
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• pp.1-7
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• 2023

A grid-connected 3-level NPC inverter is a power conversion device that connects renewable energy generators, such as photovoltaic or wind turbines to the grid. Although many studies have focused on this inverter, commercializing it requires strictly satisfying various safety and power quality-related standards. Among many standards, leakage current and grid current total harmonic distortion(THD) can be affected by external factors such as installation environment, aging, and grid conditions. Hence, inverter operations that can satisfy these standards need to be explored. In this study a 3-level NPC inverter operation algorithm using the Phase Opposition Disposition-PWM method that can effectively reduce leakage current and switching frequency adjustment to reduce THD effectively has been proposed.

• Journal of Power Electronics
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• v.16 no.2
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• pp.455-463
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• 2016

This paper proposes a compensation method to improve the distorted space vectors when a 3-level Neutral Point Clamped (NPC) inverter has an unbalanced neutral point voltage. Since both the neutral point voltage of the DC link and the space vector of a 3-level NPC inverter are closely related depending on the output load connecting state, a distorted space vector can occur when the neutral point voltage of a 3-level NPC inverter is unbalanced. The proposed method can improve the distorted space vectors by adjusting the injection time of the small and medium vectors and by modulating the amplitude of the carrier waveforms. In this paper, the proposed method is verified by both simulation and experimental results based on a 3-level NPC inverter.

• The Transactions of the Korean Institute of Power Electronics
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• v.19 no.3
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• pp.257-265
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• 2014

This paper proposes a simple compensation method for switches of the unclamped voltage in the three-level NPC inverter. Voltages of inner-switches can be unclamped in the three-level NPC (neutral point clamped) inverter. It can cause the problem of the switch fault accident. By adding a capacitor, switches of the unclamped voltage can be clamped. Through the analysis of the circuit, the reason behind switches being unclamped was verified which leads to the solution method that designs a compensation capacitor. The proposed method was validated through the simulation and experimental results.

• Proceedings of the KIPE Conference
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• 2014.07a
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• pp.546-547
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• 2014

본 논문에서는 LabVIEW와 Multisim을 이용한 Co-simultion 기능으로 얻은 시뮬레이션 결과와 그 과정을 기술한다. 3-Level NPC Inverter를 제어하였으며 동일한 조건에서 PSIM으로 시뮬레이션한 결과와 비교하여 보았다.

• The Transactions of The Korean Institute of Electrical Engineers
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• v.64 no.2
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• pp.268-275
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• 2015

This paper proposes a method of switching to improve power loss for the single-phase three-level NPC inverter. The conventional switching methods, which are called as the bipolar and unipolar switching methods, are used for single phase inverters using three-level topology. However, these switching method have disadvantage in the power loss. Because all of the switch are operated. To reduce the power loss of the three-level NPC inverter, clamp switching method is introduced in this paper. This way, one of the lag is fixed that switching loss is reduced. This paper analyzes and compares power losses of unipolar method and clamp method. The validity of the power loss analysis is verified through the simulation and experimental results.

• The Transactions of the Korean Institute of Electrical Engineers B
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• v.54 no.5
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• pp.231-237
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• 2005

Many conventional multi-level inverters have detected switching faults by using the over voltage and current. However, fault detection of the switching elements is very difficult because the voltage and current due to each switching fault decrease more than the normal operation. Moreover, the dc-link unbalancing voltage causes a serious problem in the safety and reliability of system when the 3-level inverter faults occur Therefore, this paper proposes the simple fault diagnose method and the neutral-point-voltage control method that can protect the 3-level inverter system from the unbalancing voltage of the do-link capacitors when the faults of switching elements occur in the 3-level inverter that is very efficient in ac motor drives of the high voltage and high power applications. Through experiment results, the validity of the proposed method is demonstrated.

• The Transactions of the Korean Institute of Power Electronics
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• v.13 no.1
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• pp.22-32
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• 2008

This paper proposes a linearization technique for the 3-level NPC type inverter, which increases the linear control range of Inverter up to the one-pulse inverter. The overmodulation range is divided into two modes depending on the Modulation Index, MI. In overmodulation region I, the reference angles are derived from the fourier series expansion of the reference voltage corresponding to the MI. In overmodulation region II, the holding angles are also derived in the same way. Therefore, it is possible to obtain the linear control and the maximized utilization of PWM inverter output voltage.

• The Transactions of the Korean Institute of Power Electronics
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• v.27 no.6
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• pp.535-540
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• 2022

DC-link capacitors are reliability-critical components in a photovoltaic (PV) inverter. Typically, the lifetime of a DC-link capacitor is evaluated by considering the voltage and hot-spot temperature of the capacitor under the specific operating condition of the PV inverter. However, the output of the PV inverter is determined by solar irradiation and ambient temperature, which vary with the seasons; accordingly, the hot-spot temperature of the capacitor also changes. Therefore, the mission profile of the PV system should be considered to effectively evaluate the reliability of the DC-link capacitor. In this study, the reliability of the DC-link capacitor of a three-level NPC inverter is comparatively analyzed with and without considering the mission profiles of the PV system, where two mission profiles recorded in Arizona and Iza are considered. The accumulated damage of the DC-link capacitor is calculated based on the lifetime model by analyzing its thermal loading. Afterward, a reliability evaluation of the DC-link capacitor is performed at the component level and then at the system level by considering all capacitors by means of Monte Carlo analysis. Results reveal the importance of performing a mission-profile-based reliability evaluation during the design of high-reliability PV inverters to achieve the target reliability performance.

• The Transactions of the Korean Institute of Power Electronics
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• v.13 no.1
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• pp.9-14
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• 2008

Since they use the low switching frequency in multilevel inverter systems, they generate the high low frequency harmonic components. Generally, LC filter is used at the output terminal of inverter systems to solve this problem. But it causes a voltage drop at the output terminal by use of damping resistors, and causes the problem in which system efficiency decreases due to power loss of the damping resistor. In this paper, we proposed an output filter design method for NPC three-level inverter systems with low switching frequency. And we analyzed the efficiency of the proposed filter system, and the effectiveness of the proposed system is verified by simulation and experimental results.