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This article presents two single-phase to single-phase three-wire converters based on two-level and three-level neutral-point-clamped legs. The converters present a shared-leg between the grid and load. A space-vector pulsewidth modulation technique considering the harmonic distortion and the semiconductor losses is presented, besides the dc-link voltage-balance technique to balance the neutral-point voltage. The converters can supply the loads with constant amplitude and frequency under grid voltage disturbances. These characteristics make the proposed converters suitable for applications as uninterrupted power supply. The proposed converters are compared to a conventional two-level converter from simulated results for evaluating the semiconductor losses and harmonic distortion. The experimental results are provided to illustrate and validate the operation of the proposed systems. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This article proposes four converters for interfacing a single dc power source and loads of a single-phase three-wire system. The topologies of the proposed converters are based on two-level (2L) and three-level neutral point clamped (NPC) legs. For regulating the dc-link capacitors of the NPC-based converters, a dc-link voltage-balancing technique is proposed to balance the neutral-point voltage using the space-vector pulsewidth modulation, considering the harmonic distortion of the output voltages and the semiconductor losses from an algorithm that defines the vector sequences to be applied. These characteristics make the proposed converters suitable for applications in microgrid employing dc distributed energy resources or ac power supply by adding ac–dc stage. The proposed converters are compared to a conventional 2 L converter from simulated results for evaluating the semiconductor losses in balanced and unbalanced load scenarios. Experimental results are presented to verify the effectiveness of the proposed voltage-balancing technique and to validate the converters. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This paper proposes two hybrid asymmetric cascaded multilevel inverters for driving medium-voltage open-end winding motors. Each phase of the proposed systems consist of a three-level (3L) H-bridge cell and a nine-level (9L) H-bridge cell connected in series. An unequal dc-voltage ratio of 1:8 between cells is used, providing 19 phase voltage levels. The topologies of the 9L H-bridge cell are based on modular multilevel cascade converter (MMCC) with double-star chopper cells, while the 3L H-bridge cell is fed by a floating capacitor. Compared to conventional MMCC for open-end stator winding motor drives, the proposed inverters can produce more phase voltage levels. In addition, they require a smaller number of power semiconductor switches, drivers and capacitors. Simulations and experimental results are presented in order to demonstrate the performance and feasibility of the proposed topologies. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This paper investigates two power generation systems that utilize a rectifier with small number of controlled switches associated to a two-phase permanent magnet synchronous machine. The proposed topologies have as a main purpose converting wind energy into electrical energy for low-power applications, giving them large potential to be employed in urban and rural areas. Each configuration is commanded by only two controlled switches and has natural protection against short circuit on the dc link. Compared with two three-phase generation systems that use a reduced number of controlled switches, the proposed topologies permit obtaining sinusoidal machine currents, with low harmonic distortion, using a smaller number of controlled switches. At last, to investigate the proposed system and control strategy, simulation and experimental results are presented. [ABSTRACT FROM PUBLISHER]

This paper proposes and investigates a multilevel ac six-phase motor drive. The system is composed of five isolated three-leg voltage source inverters feeding the open-end windings of an asymmetrical six-phase induction motor (SPIM), which is adequate to generate multilevel voltages for high-power systems with voltage rating restrictions. A simple space vector pulse-width modulation (PWM) based on three similar individual planes and its implementation by means of equivalent level-shifted PWM are presented. A space vector pattern with a high number of voltage vectors redundancies is obtained. These redundancies and the application sequence of the voltage vectors are selected to minimize the amount of changes in the switching states and to decrease the harmonic distortion of the generated voltages. The vector pattern of this optimal modulation is obtained by analyzing only one plane and applied in the same way to the three planes as if they were independent. The developed PWM techniques have low computational complexity and are suitable for low-cost hardware implementations. Simulation results are used to compare the proposed topology with a conventional configuration in terms of harmonic distortion and semiconductor losses. Experimental results demonstrate the feasibility of the proposed drive system. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This paper presents multilevel ac–dc single-phase power conversion cells for applications in which the regenerative operation is either not required or prohibited. The ac primary power source is a single phase from a permanent magnet generator or from an electrical grid. The cells are composed of two h-bridges in cascade: 1) an unidirectional high-voltage h-bridge with two controlled switches; and 2) two power diodes, processing the active power, and a low-voltage h-bridge with four controlled switches and a floating capacitor. These cells can be part of multiphase systems, in which it is required one cell for each phase. Some examples of application for three-phase systems are given, exploring different ways of connection between the single-phase cells. Simulation and experimental results regarding the proposed cells and conventional h-bridge based ac–dc converters are shown for validation and comparison purposes. [ABSTRACT FROM PUBLISHER]

This paper proposes a hybrid modular multilevel drive system based on a modular multilevel cascade inverter (MMCI) with double-star chopper cells (DSCC) and a two-level (2L) inverter to feed three-phase induction motors with open-end windings (OEWs). The proposed system is an alternative for high-speed motor drives based on a small-scale DSCC topology. A voltage reference technique is presented based on the analysis of the degrees of freedom of the system for generating the output voltage references, considering any voltage ratios of the dc links. The proposed system is evaluated in a symmetric scenario, in which the dc-link voltages are equal. Thus, the 2L inverter is set up to operate at the fundamental frequency, while the DSCC inverter synthesizes the output voltage references from high-quality waveform with a significant number of voltage levels. Experimental results obtained from a downscaled 10-kVA 380-V prototype driving a full loaded 3.7-kW OEW induction motor are provided to verify the viability of the proposed system. [ABSTRACT FROM PUBLISHER]

This paper proposes two hybrid topologies based on a single ac–ac modular multilevel cascade cascade converter (MMCC) with double-star chopper cells (DSCC), in each of which a voltage reference technique (VRT) is associated for generating the output modulating references. In doing so, either the grid-connected leg or the shared leg can be switched at the line frequency, thus reducing the switching losses. For proper operation of the VRTs in real-time, the input and output converter voltages must be in sync, hence a synchronization technique is proposed. Furthermore, when no dc-link capacitor is used in a DSCC converter, the dc-link is subjected to voltage ripples derived from the pulsewidth modulation (PWM) technique. In that case, high-frequency PWM techniques can produce high-frequency components across the arm inductors, which are reflected in the dc-link. Therefore, this paper focuses on the operability of the hybrid modular multilevel DSCC converters, but also on the investigation of the proposed VRTs in reducing the dc-link voltage ripple on the conventional DSCC converter using PWM with phase-shifted carriers (PSCs). Simulated and experimental results are presented to validate the proposed techniques and converters. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This paper presents two power-generation systems with a two-phase permanent-magnet (PM) synchronous machine associated with a rectifier with small number of controlled switches. The topologies are conceived with the purpose of converting wind energy into electrical energy for low-power applications, providing an enormous potential to be used in urban areas. They can be used in applications connected to the grid or in the stand-alone mode or feeding a microgrid. Compared with some three-phase generation systems with reduced number of controlled switches, the proposed topologies permit obtaining sinusoidal controlled machine currents, reducing dc-link voltage and providing $dq$ currents with low harmonic distortion. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]