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In this paper, a new high voltage gain step-up dc–dc converter is proposed for interfacing renewable power generation. The configuration optimally integrates both the coupled-inductor and switched-capacitor techniques to achieve an ultra-high step-up gain of voltage conversion with low voltage stress and high efficiency. It consists of a voltage boost unit, a passive clamp circuit, and a symmetrical voltage multiplier network. The structure becomes modular and extendable without adding any extra winding for ultra-high step-up voltage gain. The proposed topology not only reduces the voltage stress on the main switch but also maintains it steady for the entire duty cycle range. Furthermore, the reverse recovery issue of the diodes is alleviated through the leakage inductance of the coupled inductor. The operation principle and steady-state analysis are presented in detail. Experimental evaluation validates the claimed advantages and demonstrates a well-distributed efficiency curve and the peak of 96.70%. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This paper proposes a novel isolated bidirectional two-switch flyback converter with two integrated non-dissipative inductor–capacitor–diode (LCD) snubbers. In the proposed topology, the main flyback transformer and the LCD snubbers are cross coupled to minimize circulating current that would occur in the non-cross-coupled case, in addition to recycle leakage energy and protect the power transistors. The same current circulation issue also occurs in the bidirectional flyback converter with conventional resistor–capacitor–diode (RCD) snubbers. The main objective of this paper is to illustrate this issue and propose an alternate circuitry to reduce the current circulation and improve the conversion efficiency. The experimental results of a laboratory prototype are reported to verify the design. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

State of charge (SoC) imbalance among batteries in a battery energy storage system (BESS) degrades the system performance and may lead to safety issue. A bidirectional multiple-input Ćuk converter for the BESS is proposed to prevent batteries from SoC imbalance issue. Compared to the traditional BESS, the battery balancing and voltage/current regulation subsystems are combined into one. As a result, the overall system complexity is significantly reduced. Moreover, the current flow of each battery is self-adjusted according to its terminal voltage. Therefore, the system does not require sophisticated control algorithm for battery balancing. Moreover, the proposed system has no energy dumping and energy transferring between batteries, which avoids unnecessary energy lose. Due to the nature of multiple-input converter structure, the proposed system can handle certain component failure. The proposed approach of designing the BESS has been investigated through simulation and validated experimentally. [ABSTRACT FROM PUBLISHER]

This letter presents a graph-theoretic approach to deriving a family of dual-switch step-down dc/dc converters with fault-tolerant capability. The constraint sets in the derivation process ensure that minimum additional component is used to achieve fault-tolerant operation. The operation of converters derived is flexible. Under normal operating conditions, one of the two switches can serve as a main switch to control the power flow (i.e., single-switch converter operation) and the other switch is in stand-by mode. When a fault occurs on the main switch, the other switch will be activated to provide an alternate current path to continue converter operation and maintain output regulation. The fault-tolerant converters are derived by integrating a buck converter with a buck–boost converter. They share all the components except for the power switches. Due to different duty cycles required between the two operating conditions, a feedback controller is necessary to adjust the duty cycle for tight output regulation. The derivation procedure and experimental results on fault occurrence are reported. The converter derivation approach is able to identify reported topologies and can be extended to synthesize other topologies with fault-tolerant capability. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Single-stage power-factor-corrected (S2PFC) power supplies usually suffer from high voltage stress, due to lack of control on the intermediate bus capacitor voltage. In the past, analysis of such voltage stress was mostly based on steady-state condition without providing sufficient explanation during the transient circuit operation. This paper revisits the problem at circuit level and reports that the root cause is due to the inherent negative current feedback property of the output inductor or the transformer operating in continuous conduction mode (CCM). Based on the finding, this paper further proposes a new approach to reducing the voltage stress by adding an auxiliary circuit branch to existing S2PFC converters. The additional circuit branch limits the effect of negative current feedback by suppressing the change of output current slope due to change of load. This assists the pulsewidth modulation controller to track the change of load better such that the bus capacitor voltage range is reduced through duty cycle control. The auxiliary circuit branch also reduces reverse-recovery-related losses of the converter under CCM operation. A laboratory prototype using the popular boost PFC converter combined flyback dc/dc converter was built and tested to confirm the analysis and effectiveness of the approach. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

In this paper, the two-input buck converter is proposed as the dc/dc stage for photovoltaic (PV) cascaded converters. This converter is attractive for this application because it is cost effective and reliable and can achieve dual maximum power point tracking (MPPT) with only one power transistor. However, due to the simplified and integrated structure, the nonlinear characteristics of the converter and the two PV arrays complicate the control. By means of a small-signal modeling, the control theme of the two PV voltages is formulated, and the effect of the nonlinearities is presented. It is shown that, while fast voltage dynamics are achieved for the first input, the second-input voltage response depends on the second-stage converter control. Simulation and experimental results are reported to validate the theoretical analysis, showing the dual MPPT capability. [ABSTRACT FROM PUBLISHER]

Existing bridgeless boost (BLB) converter with soft switching utilize more than two active switches and extra resonant networks. In this paper, a new zero-current-switching BLB rectifier with high power factor (PF) using only two active switches is proposed. The proposed BLB converter is based on a totem-pole BLB (TPBLB) configuration, which allows the current to flow from high side to low side and vice versa during resonance. Hence, no auxiliary active switch is needed to provide soft switching for all semiconductor devices. The soft switching also reduces the body diode reverse recovery problem, hence allowing the TPBLB to operate in continuous conduction mode. Standard components are used to prove that the proposed converter is working with an acceptable performance compared with other BLB converters with soft switching. In order to achieve smooth input current waveform, high PF, and wide soft-switching operations, a pulsewidth modulation controller is proposed and developed, which combines a conventional PF correction average current mode controller with several logic gates and a phase detector. A detailed analysis of the converter operation and control is presented. Design considerations and parameter values calculations are given. An experimental prototype is developed and tested to verify the converter performance. [ABSTRACT FROM PUBLISHER]

A single-switch nonisolated dc/dc converter for a stand-alone photovoltaic (PV)-battery-powered pump system is proposed in this paper. The converter is formed by combining a buck converter with a buck-boost converter. This integration also resulted in reduced repeated power processing, hence improving the conversion efficiency. With only a single transistor, the converter is able to perform three tasks simultaneously, namely, maximum-power-point tracking (MPPT), battery charging, and driving the pump at constant flow rate. To achieve these control objectives, the two inductors operate in different modes such that variable switching frequency control and duty cycle control can be used to manage MPPT and output voltage regulation, respectively. The battery in the converter provides a more steady dc-link voltage as compared to that of a conventional single-stage converter and hence mitigates the high voltage stress problem. Experimental results of a 14-W laboratory prototype converter with a maximum efficiency of 92% confirmed the performance of the proposed converter when used in a PV-battery pump system. [ABSTRACT FROM PUBLISHER]

A thermoelectric generator (TEG) is a low-voltage high-current dc power source with a linear V–I characteristic, and therefore, it is desirable to create a power converter with a topology and control method suited to these attributes. Due to the TEG’s low voltage, a topology that produces a high step-up gain for a moderate duty cycle is required to reduce voltage and current stresses within the converter. The linear V–I characteristic produces a P–I characteristic with a flatter peak relative to other sources. This can result in large operating point variations while performing maximum power point tracking (MPPT); thus, an algorithm with low steady-state error is desired. This paper presents a novel high step-up dc/dc converter topology operating with a fractional short-circuit MPPT algorithm for use with a 4.2-V, 3.4-A (for matched load at \Delta T = \270\,^\circ C) TEG module and a converter output of 180 V. Compared to existing high step-up dc/dc converters, the proposed converter achieves higher gain with similar component count. Experimental results are reported to confirm the converter analysis and better performance of the short-circuit MPPT algorithm over the perturb and observe algorithm. [ABSTRACT FROM PUBLISHER]

This paper presents a high step-down tranformerless single-stage single-switch ac/dc converter suitable for universal line applications (90-270 Vrms) . The topology integrates a buck-type power-factor correction (PFC) cell with a buck-boost dc/dc cell and part of the input power is coupled to the output directly after the first power processing. With this direct power transfer feature and sharing capacitor voltages, the converter is able to achieve efficient power conversion, high power factor, low voltage stress on intermediate bus (less than 130 V) and low output voltage without a high step-down transformer. The absence of transformer reduces the component counts and cost of the converter. Unlike most of the boost-type PFC cell, the main switch of the proposed converter only handles the peak inductor current of dc/dc cell rather than the superposition of both inductor currents. Detailed analysis and design procedures of the proposed circuit are given and verified by experimental results. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This paper discusses the major issues that exist in the single-stage ac/dc converters with power factor correction (PFC) and presents a novel converter based on a quasi-active PFC scheme. Two additional windings wound in the transformer of a conventional dc/dc flyback converter are used to drive and achieve continuous current mode operation of an input inductor. In addition, direct energy transfer paths are provided through the additional windings to improve the conversion efficiency and to reduce the dc bus capacitor voltage below 450 V for universal line applications. The proposed converter can be easily designed to comply with IEC 61000-3-2 Class D requirement and to achieve fast output voltage regulation. By properly tuning the converter parameters, a good tradeoff between efficiency, dc bus capacitor voltage stress, and harmonic content can be achieved. Operating principles, analysis, and experimental results of the proposed method are presented. [ABSTRACT FROM PUBLISHER]

This paper proposes a current control strategy with zero steady-state tracking error for grid-connected boost inverters. Two boost converters are controlled separately to achieve both output current tracking and balanced output voltages. Based on cascading control and feedback linearization, the inner- and outer-loop controllers are as the combination of the inversion of boost converter model and the output error compensation. After the boost converter model is linearized, proportional and resonant controllers are derived from the internal model principle to achieve zero tracking error. Experimental results confirm that the proposed control achieves good current tracking to meet stringent grid-connection harmonics standards. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

A transformerless single-stage single-switch ac/dc converter is presented in this paper. The converter allows a portion of the input power to be processed once only, resulting in enhanced conversion efficiency. Additionally, due to the absence of a transformer, the size and manufacturing cost of the converter can be reduced. The intermediate bus voltage is well kept below 400 V while maintaining high power factor even at light load and high line-input conditions. Extended experimental results on a 100-W hardware prototype for universal input-voltage range (90–270 Vrms) are given to confirm the theoretical analysis and performance of the proposed converter. [ABSTRACT FROM PUBLISHER]

This article addresses the design of reconfigurable single-inductor multiport converters with bidirectional power flow, no cross regulation, and simple control. The design uses both the voltage-source-mode and current-source-mode cells, thus allowing a full range of connectivity. The proposed single-inductor converters offer high modularity and scalability while offering bidirectional power flow and no cross regulation. The single-inductor structure reduces the overall size. The adoption of voltage-source-mode and current-source-mode cells leads to high modularity. High scalability is achieved due to arbitrary ports being allowed to the derived converters. Moreover, the topology inherently achieves no cross regulation among the output ports. The ports of the derived converters are reconfigurable, permitting transformation among single-input multi-output mode, multi-input multi-output mode, and multi-input single-output mode. Through the transformation of operating modes, bidirectional power flow is achieved. Thus, regenerative loads can be integrated seamlessly. In terms of control, the absence of cross regulation permits the adoption of very simple control design, leading to high flexibility. Thus, the derived converters can integrate multiple and various kinds of terminating sources and loads simultaneously with simple control methods. A reconfigurable single-inductor four-port converter is presented for illustration. Finally, experimental results are presented to verify the analytical findings. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This paper presents a new approach to controlling and optimizing a single-stage boost-integrated full-bridge dc–dc converter for a stand-alone photovoltaic-battery-powered dc motor system by combining pulse-frequency modulation (PFM), pulsewidth modulation (PWM), and phase angle shift (PAS). Unlike most of the existing multiport dc–dc converters, which aim at regulating the output voltage (first- or second-quadrant operation), the dc motor load requires both voltage and current reversals (four-quadrant operation). The converter is able to perform three tasks simultaneously: maximum power point tracking (MPPT), battery charging/discharging, and driving the dc motor at variable speeds including bidirectional and stall motions. To achieve these control objectives, the boost inductor and the motor inductance operate in different modes such that PFM and PWM can be used to achieve MPPT and a wide motor voltage range, respectively. By properly adjusting the PAS of the duty cycles, the capacitor and battery rms current value can be reduced, while the operation of the converter remains unchanged, hence improving the conversion efficiency. Experimental results of a 26-W laboratory prototype converter confirmed the proposed design and operation and the efficiency improvement by 2–6%. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

To support the development of high-frequency ac microgrids in terms of compact design, high-voltage gain and low total harmonic distortion (THD), a buck–boost dual-leg-integrated step-up inverter is proposed in this paper. The inverter is formed by integrating a buck–boost converter into a conventional single-phase full-bridge inverter by sharing the upper switch and the body diode of the lower switch in both bridge-legs. Consequently, the component count is significantly reduced over the step-up inverter counterparts. In addition, to address the drawbacks of hybrid modulation methods adopted by existing dual-leg-integrated inverters, such as double-variable control, and high THD of output voltage/current at high input voltage and heavy load conditions, unipolar frequency doubling sinusoidal pulse width modulation scheme is adopted in this inverter. As a result, the modulation ratio M becomes the only control variable to regulate the output voltage/current and the control is simplified. The THD of the proposed inverter output can remain low throughout the entire input voltage range and load power range. This paper presents the topology derivation procedure, operation principle, and steady-state characteristics of the proposed inverter. To validate the effectiveness of theory, experimental results of a 400 W hardware prototype, where the output voltage frequency is at 500 Hz, are reported. [ABSTRACT FROM PUBLISHER]

In this article, we present a family of multilevel converters with the single-stage dynamic voltage-boosting feature, reduced number of circuit components, modular structure, bidirectional operation, continuous input current, and acceptable overall efficiency. The proposed structure is based on a three-level single-stage boost integrated inverter with an embedded quasi-H-bridge (QHB) cell. It is comprised of five unidirectional power switches and a floating capacitor. By differential connection of two or three QHB cells and with the aim of a single inductor/input dc source, several derived topologies for both the single and three-phase applications with different multilevel output voltage performances have been achieved. The aforementioned advantages make this converter a suitable candidate for renewable energy applications. Theoretical analysis, design consideration, comparative study, and several experimental results for a 3-kW laboratory-built system are presented to validate the effectiveness and feasibility of this proposal. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Inductor design in dc–dc converters needs to be carried out considering the current ripple, converter volume, and saturation current limit. This article presents an inductor core-biasing technique (ICBT) to minimize the current ripple without increasing the inductance value. In contrast to prior works, an ac bias is used, and the ripple reduction under the proposed ICBT is demonstrated through simulations in MATLAB/Simulink under linear and saturation conditions. Experimental results are further provided to validate the simulation results for different inductance values. It is demonstrated that the proposed ICBT can significantly lower the inductance value required for achieving the same ripple current while offering the enhanced saturation capability and improved efficiency for the same core size. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Multi-input multi-output (MIMO) dc–dc converters can integrate multiple input sources and output loads simultaneously. This article proposes a new single-inductor MIMO dc–dc converter with a wide conversion ratio. The proposed converter allows input sources to be added or removed seamlessly with no cross-regulation problem. Meanwhile, the outputs are independently controlled, i.e., the load change at one output cell will not affect the other interconnected output cells. Constant current control is the main control requirement. When constant current control is applied to all input cells, the power provided by each input source is proportional to the voltage magnitude of the source. When the constant current control is applied to some of the input cells, the input sources with direct duty-cycle controlled input cells can provide specific power through controlling the duty cycles of the switches of the corresponding input cells. Moreover, the switching time of switches is irrelevant. Therefore, it is easy to realize the high extension capability for arbitrary inputs/outputs. A dual-input dual-output prototype is constructed to illustrate the performance of the proposed converter. The corresponding component design is presented. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]