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Subsea oil and gas (O&G) exploration demands significantly high power to supply the electrical loads for extraction and pumping of the oil and gas. The energy demand is usually met by fossil fuel combustion-based platform generation, which releases a substantial volume of greenhouse gases including carbon dioxide (CO2) and methane into the atmosphere. The severity of the resulting adverse environmental impact has increased the focus on more sustainable and environment-friendly power processing for deepwater O&G production. The most feasible way toward sustainable power processing lies in the complete electrification of subsea systems. This paper aims to dive deep into the technology trends that enable an all-electric subsea grid and the real-world challenges that hinder the proliferation of these technologies. Two main enabling technologies are the transmission of electrical power from the onshore electrical grid to the subsea petroleum installations or the integration of offshore renewable energy sources to form a microgrid to power the platform-based and subsea loads. This paper reviews the feasible power generation sources for interconnection with subsea oil installations. Next, this interconnection's possible power transmission and distribution architectures are presented, including auxiliary power processing systems like subsea electric heating. As the electrical fault is one of the major challenges for DC systems, the fault protection topologies for the subsea HVDC architectures are also reviewed. A brief discussion and comparison of the reviewed technologies are presented. Finally, the critical findings are summarized in the conclusion section. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

In this paper, an H‐type electric/hybrid electric aircraft propulsion architecture is proposed to address the issues associated with the radial electric propulsion architecture. In a radial architecture, a fault on the main bus or failure of the generator leads to shut down of all the propulsion motors in that channel, thus increasing the burden on the remaining motors to maintain the power required by the aeroplane. As a result, it is necessary to oversize the motors for the purpose of compensating for the loss of other motors. To mitigate these issues, a new H‐type architecture is introduced to isolate the particular faulty section while still maintaining power flow to the remaining healthy motors. The proposed architecture minimises the oversizing of various components in the system as compared to radial propulsion architecture. The sizing of components and the amount of overall mass reduction is discussed by using the proposed architecture. Typhoon Hardware in the Loop platform is used to validate the performance of both the architectures for faults at different locations, and the results are presented. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

An isolated multilevel bidirectional dc–dc converter is presented in this article to interface the low-voltage (LV) battery and the high-voltage (HV) propulsion inverter in electric vehicles. The proposed topology achieves a HV step-up ratio in the motoring mode by reconfiguring two split capacitor half-bridge circuits in series/parallel through the symmetrical modulation of a voltage bidirectional, two quadrant switch. This reconfiguration generates a high-frequency multilevel voltage output at the dc-bus side of the inverter, which reduces the output filter volume. The dc-bus voltage is regulated by the duty cycle modulation of the intermediary switch in the motoring mode, simplifying the sensing and control. During regenerative braking, the converter is operated with phase shift modulation between the HV half bridges and the LV full bridge to regulate the battery voltage. The presented modulation strategies achieve zero voltage switching for the full-bridge devices over a wide load range. A comprehensive analysis of the proposed multilevel converter in motoring and braking modes along with the design constraints and soft switching boundary conditions is presented in this article. Detailed experimental results on a 1.5-kW laboratory prototype are presented to verify the design approach and illustrate the converter performance. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Direct electrical heating (DEH) is a well-established method for preventing hydrate formation inside subsea oil transfer pipelines. However, poor efficiency and high reactive power requirement of the existing line-frequency DEH systems have necessitated high-frequency power processing along with reactive power compensation. To meet these design objectives, a dc–ac converter using an LCCL resonant tank is presented in this article to function as a high-frequency alternating current source. The LCCL resonant tank is tuned at the frequency of the maximum tank current gain to maximize the heat generation and reduce the VA rating of the tank. The maximum tank current gain operation also ensures zero-voltage switching of the bridge inverter devices. Detailed frequency domain analysis and design guidelines are presented for the proposed LCCL resonant inverter (RI). Experimental results on a 10-A laboratory prototype and controller hardware-in-the-loop results for a 350-A system illustrate the advantages of the LCCL RI in DEH application. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

DC-link-based variable speed constant frequency (VSCF) ac power generating system is being considered as one of the popular power architectures in the new generation aircraft to provide backup power to the 115 V, 400 Hz aircraft loads. These systems directly convert the variable frequency output of the generator to the fixed frequency of 400 Hz using a voltage source inverter. These inverters use dc-link capacitors that are heavy and space consuming. In aircraft, the weight requirement is very critical; hence, minimizing the dc-link capacitance is one of the major research challenges to achieve high power density in the VSCF power converter. In this article, novel control strategies to minimize the dc-link capacitance of the ac–dc–ac VSCF power converter are presented. The proposed control strategies enable to achieve 95% reduction in dc-link capacitance value when compared with the conventional control strategy, while the control is robust enough to meet MIL-STD-704F transient specification at the inverter output. The proposed strategies are validated through controller hardware-in-loop testing of the VSCF system based on an 80 kVA brushless synchronous generator and a four-leg inverter. The transient and steady-state operation of the VSCF system with a 95% reduction in dc-link capacitance has been verified for rated power operation. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This paper proposes a soft-switched modulation technique with synchronous rectification for an isolated single-stage single-phase matrix-type dc–ac converter. The dc side consists of a full bridge inverter, and the ac side is a 2×2 matrix converter-based cycloconverter. The proposed unipolar modulation strategy provides zero current switching/zero voltage switching (ZVS) for the ac side devices and ZVS-on for the dc side devices. It also allows natural commutation of the current flowing through the secondary side leakage inductor of the isolation transformer and the grid inductor during unity power factor (UPF) condition, thus eliminates the requirement of snubber circuit. An improved soft-switched flyback-based regenerative snubber circuit is also presented for non-UPF operation. Proposed snubber circuit recycles the energy stored in the snubber capacitors in every switching cycle. A guideline to design snubber circuit along with a comparative study is discussed in this paper. Performance of the proposed hybrid modulation technique is evaluated in an SiC mosfet based 1.2-kW dc–ac converter prototype. A detailed analysis of the converter performance has been presented in this paper considering the circuit non-idealities. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This paper proposes a coupled inductor-based hybrid dc circuit breaker topology with zero current switching for fast fault interruption in dc systems. A series resonant circuit comprising of the secondary winding of a two-winding coupled inductor and a charged capacitor (commutation capacitor) is switched on during fault to inject a counter-current pulse, and, consequently, force a zero crossing of fault current. Proposed solution facilitates arcless breaking for a mechanical circuit breaker due to zero current turn-off. The proposed circuit breaker exhibits fast fault response ($\sim$ 30  $\mu$ s), and the response time is programmable based on the design of the coupled inductor and commutation capacitor. Furthermore, presented solution mitigates the requirement of energy-absorbing elements for demagnetizing the dc network following fault interruption, in contrast to conventional dc breakers. The paper also presents two modified circuit-breaker topologies to achieve unipolar voltage profile on the capacitor, which will enable the use of electrolytic capacitors for commutation so that the capacitor stack size is reduced in high-voltage applications. Detailed analysis and design equations are presented to explain the operation of the proposed topologies. Functionality of the proposed circuit breakers is verified through simulation, and experimental results are based on two laboratory prototypes. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Permanent magnet (PM) motors are gaining prominence in subsea applications such as drilling, pumping, and boosting for oil and natural gas extraction. These motors are gradually replacing traditional induction motors. However, starting and operating PM motors at low speeds under heavy loads poses significant challenges. This is because of unknown initial rotor positions and resistive voltage drops due to the presence of a sinewave filter, transformer, and long cable. An unknown rotor position may result in temporary reverse speed, which may cause a loss of synchronism; therefore, initial rotor position estimation is preferable. Additionally, addressing the voltage drop issue requires careful voltage compensation to avoid transformer core saturation. In this paper, an enhanced V / H z starting of a PM motor is proposed with initial position detection (IPD) and voltage compensation to start the motor reliably with a heavy load. The proposed control method is verified with controller hardware in the loop (C-HIL) real-time simulation using a Typhoon HIL-604 emulator and a Texas Instruments TMS320F28335 digital signal processor (DSP) control card. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

In automotive testing systems such as chassis dynamometers and engine dynamometers, effective and efficient control strategies are required to control the induction motor drives, so that fast torque response and low-torque ripples can be obtained. The fast torque response can be obtained by using model predictive control (MPC) due to its high bandwidth over a wide-speed range; and the torque ripple can be reduced by using open-end winding induction motor (OEWIM). Since MPC can be current based or flux/torque based, and can be linear and non-linear, it is necessary to evaluate the effectiveness of different MPC methods on the open-end winding drives. In this study, linear and non-linear current-based MPC methods and flux/torque-based MPC methods for OEWIM drive are derived and evaluated. The transient and steady-state responses of MPC methods are compared through simulation and experiment. The results show that linear MPC methods require less computation time, and under the same sampling frequency, linear MPC methods provide lower current ripple and better zero-sequence-current suppression than non-linear MPC methods. This study provides practical perception for MPC used on multi-level converters and MPC used for unbalanced situations. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Cascasded delayed signal cancellation (DSC) phase-locked loop (PLL) technique has been attractive for grid synchronization under nonideal grid voltage due to its good harmonics filtering capability. However, it has to face the challenge of slow dynamic response. In this paper, an improved DSC-PLL that features high filtering capability, fast dynamic response and simple structure is presented. This PLL employs only one DSC block and one moving average filter (MAF) block to eliminate all even-order and odd-order harmonics while a second-order phase lead compensator and q-axis feedforward path are introduced to increase the PLL bandwidth. The effect of the phase lead compensator on PLL dynamic performance is analyzed. The feedforward path works only when grid voltage frequency or phase jumps and will not affect the steady state behaviors. Therefore, the PLL can improve the phase estimation accuracy and dynamic speed at the same time even under highly distorted and unbalanced grid voltage. Moreover, linear Lagrange interpolation method is adopted to reduce the discretized errors in the digital implementation of the PLL. The effectiveness of the proposed method is validated by both simulation and experimental results. The comparison results with the existing cascaded DSC-PLL and standard MAF-PLL are also presented. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The papers in this special section focus on the fuel cell systems with particular emphasis on extended the lifetime and robustness of these systems. The fuel cell is an electrochemical device that converts the chemical energy stored in a fuel directly into electrical energy, with only heat and water as by-products. Hence, it is one of the cleanest technologies for producing electric power. However, the durability of fuel cells is a main concern for the massive deployment of fuel cell technology for transportation and stationary power generation applications. The fuel cell power generation system consists of a fuel cell stack and the balance of plant consisting of auxiliary units such as air compressor, cooling circuit, power converter, etc. The fuel cell?s lifetime is closely related to its electrode/electrolyte material aging and degradation during its operation. Over time and with use, the degradation of fuel cell performance cannot be avoided; however, with well-designed balance of plant and control system, the rate of performance degradation can be minimized, and the robustness of the fuel cell systems can be improved. [ABSTRACT FROM PUBLISHER]

In more electric aircraft (MEA) system, both ac and dc electric power with multiple voltage levels are required for various aircraft loads. This paper presents an induction generator-based ac/dc hybrid electric power generation system for MEA. In the proposed system architecure, a high-speed induction starter/generator and a low-speed induction generator are installed on the high pressure (HP) and low pressure (LP) spools of the engine, respectively. In generating mode of operation, all of the constant voltage variable frequency ac power is generated by the HP generator while the dc power demand is shared by both HP and LP generators. A control scheme is developed to regulate the ac load voltage and coordinate dc power generation between the two generators. The proposed induction generator based ac/dc hybrid generation system results in reduced hardware requirement compared with both ac and dc primary generation systems. [ABSTRACT FROM PUBLISHER]

Abstract—Fuel cells are being explored for several applications, such as transportation, microgrids, back-up power, grid-connected and stationary power generation, portable appliances, etc. Fuel cells are preferred because of their secured and continuous output, zero or low emissions, and high efficiency. This article presents a review of the power conversion and control strategies for fuel cell systems for transportation and stationary power generation. The control characteristics and properties of fuel cells being used in these applications are discussed. A few power conversion system architectures for propulsion and power generation are presented. The present status and future strategies for advancement of fuel cell based systems are also presented. [ABSTRACT FROM PUBLISHER]

PAPER 3: An H-TYPE ARCHITECTURE FOR ELECTRIC/HYBRID-ELECTRIC AIRCRAFT PROPULSION SYSTEMS In this study a novel H-type hybrid-electric aircraft propulsion architecture is proposed to address the issues associated with the radial electric propulsion architecture. Public and political pressures for environmental improvements are driving a wave of current interest in all-electric and hybrid-electric aircraft. These emerging new aircraft propulsion systems bring with them the promise of net-zero emissions and greatly reduced noise profiles. [Extracted from the article]

Battery energy storage systems (BESS) based on modular multilevel converters (MMCs) allow battery packs to be integrated into the electrical grid in a modular fashion. Inherent to the operation of the MMC, the module's dc-link capacitor voltage experiences oscillations at grid frequency and its harmonics. This article investigates the close relation between this voltage oscillation and the battery current ripple. The precise capacitor energy requirements for various operations of BESS-MMC, which include arm/phase power balancing and state-of-charge balancing are analyzed in this article. Furthermore, this article also explores the relation between the controller design and the submodule's (SMs) capacitor sizing in terms of its energy requirements. Design guidelines for the SM level voltage control to attenuate battery ripple and detailed analysis for the capacitor energy requirement in each operating mode are presented. The control and capacitor sizing design are validated in real-time using embedded microprocessors in a Typhoon-based controller hardware-in-the-loop environment. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

A hybrid power system consists of a combination of two or more power generation technologies to make best use of their operating characteristics and to obtain efficiencies higher than that could be obtained from a single power source. Since fuel cells directly convert fuel and an oxidant into electricity through an electrochemical process, they produce very low emissions and have higher operating efficiencies. Hence, combining fuel cells with other sources, the efficiency of the combined system can be further increased or extend the duration of the available power to the load as a backup power. In this paper, different types of fuel-cell hybrid systems and their applications are presented. An analysis of the combined cycle operation of a solid oxide fuel cell (SOFC)-microturbine is presented. A strategy for combining the thermophotovoltaic power generation unit and SOFC to obtain the hybrid power system that would have higher efficiency is proposed. The hybrid operation of wind power and solar power system with proton exchange membrane fuel cell is also presented. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Deals with a study which examined a torque-controlled devices based on machine flux and torque estimation. Integration of the stator voltage equation; Calculation of the rotation angle; Results and conclusions.

This article proposes a multilevel dc–dc converter topology for fast charging of electric and plug-in hybrid electric vehicles (EVs and PHEVs). The proposed dc–dc converter topology converts the front end ac–dc converter output and provides regulated supply to the EV propulsion battery. The proposed topology consists of full-bridge converter at the primary, while the secondary side consists of voltage doubler rectifier units and combination of diodes and mosfet for reconfiguration of the voltage doubler rectifiers to generate the multilevel voltage. The multilevel voltage at the output helps in reducing the output filter size and increases the power density of the converter. The topology utilizes the resonance between leakage inductor of high frequency transformer, parasitic output capacitors of full-bridge mosfets and voltage doubler capacitors to achieve soft switching (ZVS turn-on) for all the full-bridge devices and soft turn-offfor the rectifier diodes. The load limited ZVS turn on capability of conventional full-bridge topologies is mitigated through the use of resonance between magnetizing inductance of transformer and mosfet output capacitors. The converter is designed for 650 V dc bus input and 200–400 V EV battery output at 100 kW rated charging power. The analysis of the proposed converter in continuous and discontinuous modes of operation, soft switching operation, and the component design guidelines are presented in this article. The proposed converter is validated through detailed PLECS simulation results for 100 kW charging power. Experimental results from laboratory prototype of 500 W power are also presented to validate the design methodology and converter performance. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

High voltage direct current (HVdc) power transmission systems do not encounter any natural zero crossing unlike the ac systems, and hence, the dc circuit breakers employed should be fast-acting and reliable to ensure safe operation. Circuit breakers (CBs) that have fast response time with lower energy loss dissipation are required for subsea HVdc transmission systems. This article investigates the performance of various CB topologies, including ultrafast coupled inductor hybrid CB (CIHCB) topology without and with the integration of resistive-type superconducting fault current limiter (R-SFCL) for a 100-kV, 100-MW HVdc transmission systems. It is found that the addition of R-SFCL with 1.7-ms response time decreases the peak current through the breaker and, hence, the power dissipated in the CB during short-circuit fault conditions. Thus, the rating of CB can be significantly decreased with the proposed topology. Furthermore, a comparison of power loss in CIHCB with the existing topologies, such as mechanical CB, resonant CB, and HVdc-hybrid CB, are also presented in this article. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

With the integration of renewable energy sources into the power grid, a number of power electronic converters need to be connected together in parallel. Due to this interconnection among the power converters with a common DC bus, the equivalent impedance of the DC network, i.e., DC network impedance (DCNI) of these parallel converters, may vary and can cause oscillations in the DC link voltage (DCLV). In the literature, impedance models of grid-tied converters (GCs) based on the AC side are well reported without including these variations in DCNI. In addition, the dynamics of a phase-locked loop (PLL) play a significant role in GC system stability. To evaluate these stability issues, this paper proposes small signal impedance models viewing from the DC side of a three-phase GC operating under different control modes considering the PLL dynamics and the DCNI variations. Using the proposed DC impedance models (DCIM), DCLV stability analysis is evaluated for a GC. It is verified through bode plots that the interaction between the proposed DCIM and DCNI leads to unstable operation of the closed-loop converter near the PLL bandwidth when the phase difference between DCIM and DCNI is more than 180 degrees. Finally, the analytically developed models are validated using hardware in-the-loop (HIL) testing. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

In three-phase four-wire systems, the four-leg converter has been an attractive solution for mitigating power quality problems, such as reactive power compensation, load balancing, neutral current reduction, etc. However, its conventional control algorithms based on instantaneous reactive power theory (IRPT) and synchronous reference frame theory (SRFT) have relatively slow dynamic response and unstable operation during transient conditions. Thus, a novel control algorithm using double reduced-order generalized integrators for a four-leg shunt converter is presented in this article. The first integrator is adopted to extract required reference compensation currents for power quality improvement, and the second one is to decouple compensation currents and rectification currents of the converter side. The reference rectification currents are generated using an outer-loop dc-link voltage controller and are synchronized to the three-phase voltages. Since the compensation mode (dc–ac) and rectification mode (ac–dc) of converter are decoupled and regulated separately, the four-leg converter operation with fast dynamic response, robust performance, and flexible controllability is achieved. The effectiveness of the proposed algorithm is validated using both simulation and experimental results for a 1.1-kW rated system. Experimental results for the proposed scheme are presented and compared with that of existing IRPT and SRFT detection methods in the literature. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The article discusses reports published within the issue including research and development and future trends in the areas of automotive power electronics and drives and a comprehensive system review of electric, hybrid electric and plug-in hybrid electric vehicles.

Presents an introduction to the special section of the journal "IEEE Transaction on Vehicular Technology."

SiC MOSFET can operate at a junction temperature of 200–250  ^\circ C due to its improved material properties and thermal stability. However, successful realization of SiC MOSFET based high-temperature (HT) converter requires HT gate drivers. This paper presents a low-cost HT gate driver developed with discrete transistors and signal diodes rated at 180–200 ^\circ C. The gate driver has a robust overcurrent and undervoltage lock out protection circuit. The propagation delay of the protection circuit and gate driving circuit is greatly reduced compared to commercial HT gate drivers. A comparative analysis of the developed HT gate driver using discrete components and the commercially available silicon-on-insulator technology based HT gate driver is presented. The performance of the HT gate driver is evaluated for both hard switched fault and fault under load condition at an ambient temperature of 180  ^\circ C. [ABSTRACT FROM PUBLISHER]

Unbalance in a three-phase system is created due to single-phase loads and distributed single-phase renewable energy sources connected to the same system. This unbalance can be compensated locally at the point of common coupling using a three-phase four-wire grid-tied inverter. This paper presents a comparative study of three-phase four-wire inverter topologies to compensate for positive, negative, and zero sequence components of the current injected into the grid. The function of the inverter is to inject power to the grid and additional active power compensation (APC) to support unbalance, load reactive power, and load neutral current. Performance analysis and control of these topologies are being compared to evaluate utilization of dc link, size, control, and ease of implementation. A quantitative comparison of the topologies is provided to illustrate the advantages and disadvantages of the analyzed systems. The control algorithm has been presented to regulate the active and reactive power in each phase independently during both grid-connected and islanded modes. The analysis of three-phase 480-V 50-kV·A system based on three H-bridge converter is presented with simulation and experimental results. The experimental results validate the ability of the inverter to provide four-quadrant control of each phase independently. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

In this work, a multilevel 42-sided polygonal space vector structure for suppression of lower order harmonics for open-end induction motor (OEIM) drive applications is proposed. The proposed power circuit topology consists of two inverters feeding an OEIM from either side. The main inverter fed with a single dc-link providing active power for motoring operation is switched at low switching frequency. The secondary inverter fed with a capacitive supply is switched at high frequency to suppress lower order harmonics upto 39th order, up to the base speed of operation allowing maximum utilization of the dc-link. The advantages of lower order harmonic suppression in motor phase voltage, for polygonal space vector structures, are combined with multilevel inverter topology. This offers various advantages like multilevel operation with low inverter switching for the main power delivery inverter and harmonic suppression throughout the modulation range. The low switching frequency primary inverter generates harmonics of the order $6*k \pm 1$ , where $k = 1, 2, 3,{\ldots }$. The harmonics are suppressed by the capacitor-fed secondary inverter, which supplies only reactive power for suppression of lower order harmonics in motor phase voltage. Use of a single dc-link facilitates four-quadrant operation of the inverter. The proposed scheme is validated for steady-state and dynamic performance by experimental results. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This paper proposes a new vector-based dead-time compensation method for three-level T-type converters. The origins and effects of the dead-time voltage errors are analyzed in detail for different switching commutations and load conditions. In order to eliminate the dead-time distortion in each phase, a dead-time error voltage vector is introduced to adjust the reference voltage vector depending on load current polarity. The proposed vector-based dead-time compensation scheme has several advantages. First, it can be applied to multilevel converters with any number of voltage levels using any modulation schemes. Second, the pulse loss issue which is common in conventional pulse-based compensation strategies can be eliminated. In addition, the pulse saturation can be mitigated by operating the converters in overmodulation regions. All of these advantages and effectiveness of the proposed vector-based dead-time compensation method are verified through both simulation and experimental studies. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This paper proposes a novel multiple-input bidirectional dc–dc power converter to interface more than two dc sources of different voltage levels. This finds applications in hybrid electric/fuel cell vehicles (FCVs), where different dc sources of unequal voltage levels need to be connected with bidirectional power flow capability. The converter can be used to operate in both the buck and boost modes with bidirectional power control. It is also possible to independently control power flow between any two sources when more than two sources are actively transferring power in either directions. The operation, analysis, and design of the converter are presented with different modes of power transfer. The proposed converter is demonstrated for FCV application using real-time hardware-in-the-loop system. Experimental results for a 5-kW system are presented, validating the theoretical analysis. [ABSTRACT FROM PUBLISHER]

With the requirements for reducing emissions and improving fuel economy, automotive companies are developing electric, hybrid electric, and plug-in hybrid electric vehicles. Power electronics is an enabling technology for the development of these environmentally friendlier vehicles and implementing the advanced electrical architectures to meet the demands for increased electric loads. In this paper, a brief review of the current trends and future vehicle strategies and the function of power electronic subsystems are described. The requirements of power electronic components and electric motor drives for the successful development of these vehicles are also presented. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Extensive research done in the recent past has proven that power electronic converters and electric propulsion motors are extremely critical components for modem hybrid electric vehicle (HEV) propulsion applications. Therefore, it is essential that both the traction motor and the associated drive operate at their optimal efficiencies throughout the driving schedule. In typical HEV propulsion applications, the traction motor and the drive are used over the entire torque/speed operational range. In view of this fact, this paper aims at modeling the inverter and motor losses/efficiencies over typical city and highway driving schedules. The noteworthy losses within a typical three-phase dc/ac traction inverter, such as the switching and conduction losses for both the insulated-gate bipolar transistors and the antiparallel diodes, are modeled and simulated over the city and highway driving patterns. An induction motor (IM) is used for a medium-sized sport utility vehicle, which was modeled in the ADvanced VehIcle SimulatOR (ADVISOR) software. The significant IM losses that were considered in the study include the stator copper losses, rotor copper losses, and core losses. Thus, the average efficiencies of both the inverter drive and the induction traction motor are evaluated and summarized under city as well as highway driving conditions. Finally, based on the individual-model-based efficiency analysis, the overall traction motor drive system efficiency is estimated. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The increasing penetration of renewable energy resources (RESs) leads to a continuous displacement of synchronous generators. Since the grid integration of RESs is usually achieved through inertialess power converters, the system inertia reduces and the power system frequency stability is compromised. Consequently, unexpected generator tripping, load shedding, and even blackouts may occur and pose a great threat to the system normal operation. In view of these challenges, this article explores the possibility of providing the inertia support from power-electronics interfaced smart loads. Specifically, a transformerless electric spring topology and the associated control strategy have been developed to provide a substantial inertia support from the noncritical load. As compared with existing inertia enhancement techniques, the proposed solution is cost-effective without the need of additional energy storage units. The smart load inertia provision capability is quantitatively analyzed and experimentally verified on a laboratory-scale test. In the testing results, 40% and 18% reductions of the rate of change of frequency and the maximum frequency deviation are, respectively, observed with a 12% smart load penetration ratio. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

In islanded microgrids, distributed generations (DGs) have been increasingly employed through parallel voltage source inverters (VSIs). To fully utilize the VSI capacity and avoid overloading, the total load power is expected to be accurately shared among VSIs based on their power ratings. However, it is revealed that even small voltage measurement scaling errors may severely deteriorate the power sharing by injecting positive- and negative-sequence circulating currents. An explicit analysis indicates that this issue cannot be avoided if the conventional voltage-feedback control is adopted with an accurate fundamental voltage tracking ability. To solve this problem, a hybrid feedback and feedforward control is proposed, which makes the power sharing robust against voltage measurement errors. In specific, the feedforward control is utilized to enhance the unbalanced and reactive power sharing by reshaping the VSI fundamental output impedance. Meanwhile, the feedback-based impedance shaping control is also employed to improve the harmonic power sharing. As no communication and sensor error knowledge are required, the proposed control scheme provides a simple but effective solution for decentralized power sharing among parallel three-phase VSIs. Finally, both simulation and experimental results are provided for verification. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Due to current sensor errors, tolerance of power switching devices, and asymmetry of PWM gating driving pulses, grid-connected inverters without isolation transformer usually have certain amount of dc components injected to the ac grid. Many efforts, such as using a blocking capacitor, a current dc component feedback control, and a voltage dc component feedback control have been introduced to try to suppress the dc injection to the grid. This paper proposes a novel control strategy of suppressing dc current injection to the grid for a three-phase inverter by accurately sensing the dc component of line voltages of three-phase inverter and adding a dc component control loop. A dc suppression control scheme is presented, and the suppression performance of the proposed dc rejection method is evaluated and compared with the traditional method. Finally, the control scheme is verified on a 20-kW three-phase grid-connected inverter. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

IGBT short-circuit protection is the key factor to improve the reliability of the power electronics system. The conventional short-circuit protection method based on VCE measurement detects the collector–emitter voltage of an IGBT to determine whether the IGBT short-circuit fault occurs. The blanking circuit is needed in this kind of protection method to avoid the false triggering of the short-circuit protection during IGBT turn-on transient. However, this blanking circuit should be carefully designed for different types of IGBT modules. In order to make the IGBT short-circuit protection circuit suitable for the tolerance of IGBT modules, a self-adaptive blanking circuit combined with the aforementioned short-circuit protection method based on VCE measurement is proposed. The proposed method is achieved by feeding back the required minimum blanking time interval which is decided by comparing the desaturation reference voltage with the collector–emitter voltage. The short-circuit protection delay time for the conventional circuit and the proposed circuit are compared. Experimental results are included to prove the effectiveness of the proposed circuit. [ABSTRACT FROM PUBLISHER]

This paper proposes a novel harmonic suppression scheme for two-level inverter fed three-terminal induction motor drives using switched capacitive filter. Capacitor fed H-bridges used as filters are cascaded to conventional two-level inverter to eliminate fifth- and seventh-order harmonics for the full modulation range including a six-step operation. For the first time, two-level dodecagonal voltage space vector is implemented with single dc supply for three-terminal induction motor drive. Enabling the switched capacitive filtering at low-voltage domain and shifting the high frequency switching to the switched capacitive filter is shown. A uniform pulse width modulation technique is shown which charges and maintains the capacitor voltages while eliminating the fifth- and seventh-order harmonics for the full speed range. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This paper presents a nine-level inverter topology for an open-end induction motor drive requiring only eight switches per phase, using two three-level inverters with two isolated dc links in a 3:1 ratio. A space-vector-based formulation is used to determine pole voltages such that both inverters supply power to the load over the full modulation range, eliminating the possibility of dc bus overcharging. Proper selection of switching states ensures that all floating capacitor voltages are kept tightly balanced. A digital state machine is used to select sequences of switching states in order to eliminate deadtime-induced pole voltage transients, further improving the output-voltage quality. A level-shifted carrier-based pulse width modulation scheme is used. The steady-state and transient performance of this topology were verified and the experimental results are included. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This paper presents a new space vector pulsewidth modulation scheme to reconstruct phase currents using neutral-point current sensing in three-level T-type converters (TLTTCs). For this purpose, zero vector and offset vectors are replaced with complementary active vectors. These active vectors do not affect the resultant output voltage and the voltage balance at the neutral point of TLTTCs. Hence, the pulsewidths of corresponding active vectors can be adjusted even at low speeds without much additional switching losses and low-frequency noise in the inverter. The modified switching patterns can easily be generated without significant computational complexity. The proposed method is experimentally verified using Texas Instruments TMS320F28335 and Spartan 6 controllers, on a custom designed T-type converter based on Fuji IGBT modules. [ABSTRACT FROM PUBLISHER]

Multilevel converters have been well studied for high-voltage high-power renewable energy applications. Owing to the multibranch structure, these converters can be operated under fault conditions in case of a loss of a branch or voltage cell. In this regard, this paper proposes a new active fault-tolerant space vector pulsewidth modulation strategy for single-phase faults in three-phase multilevel converters. The proposed modulation strategy treats the multilevel converter as a two-level converter by introducing an offset vector. A generalized approach is proposed to search for the offset vector and to adjust the modulation of the converter online under different fault operation conditions. Several short- and open-circuit faults have been demonstrated on a seven-level hybrid input-switched converter to prove the effectiveness of the proposed fault-tolerant scheme. [ABSTRACT FROM PUBLISHER]

This paper proposes a vector control strategy for independent control of two permanent-magnet synchronous motors (PMSMs) using a single four-leg inverter (4LI). An expanded two-arm modulation to obtain a balanced three-phase output voltage is described. This paper also proposes a method to compensate for the fluctuations in the neutral point voltage of two split capacitors in the dc link. The experimental results show that independent speed and position control of two PMSMs can be achieved using a single 4LI with the proposed vector control method. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Efficient power conversion technologies are strategic to the advancement of fuel cell vehicles (FCVs). This paper presents an overview of power conditioning system (PCS) architectures for an FCV propulsion system. Two new power conversion topologies to obtain variable ac from the fuel cell system are proposed. The switching of the power devices are based on the proposed hybrid modulation technique that minimizes the switching losses in the inverter. The proposed converters do not use the dc-link filter capacitors. Elimination of the dc-link capacitor not only reduces the size and volume but also helps in retaining the sine wave modulated information at the input of a three-phase inverter. Bidirectional converter topologies are proposed for interfacing low-voltage battery and fuel cell dc bus. Experimental results are presented for the proposed topologies. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

In this paper, a high-temperature, high-frequency, wire-bond-based multichip phase-leg module was designed, fabricated, and fully tested. Using paralleled Silicon Carbide (SiC) MOSFETs, the module was rated at 1200 V and 60 A, and was designed for a 25-kW three-phase inverter operating at a switching frequency of 70 kHz, and in a harsh environment up to 200 °C, for aircraft applications. To this end, the temperature-dependent characteristics of the SiC MOSFET were first evaluated. The results demonstrated the superiority of the SiC MOSFET in both static and switching performances compared to Si devices, but meanwhile did reveal the design tradeoff in terms of the device's gate oxide stability. Various high-temperature packaging materials were then extensively surveyed and carefully selected for the module to sustain the harsh environment. The electrical layout of the module was also optimized using a modeling and simulation approach, in order to minimize the device parasitic ringing during high-speed switching. Finally, the static and switching performances of the fabricated module were tested, and the 200 °C continuous operation of the SiC MOSFETs was verified. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

It is well known that single-phase pulse width modulation rectifiers have second-order harmonic currents and corresponding ripple voltages on the dc bus. The low-frequency harmonic current is normally filtered using a bulk capacitor in the bus, which results in low power density. However, pursuing high power density in converter design is a very important goal in the aerospace applications. This paper studies methods for reducing the energy storage capacitor for single-phase rectifiers. The minimum ripple energy storage requirement is derived independently of a specific topology. Based on the minimum ripple energy requirement, the feasibility of the active capacitor's reduction schemes is verified. Then, we propose a bidirectional buck–boost converter as the ripple energy storage circuit, which can effectively reduce the energy storage capacitance. The analysis and design are validated by simulation and experimental results. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This paper presents the design, development, and testing of a phase-leg power module packaged by a novel planar packaging technique for high-temperature (250 °C) operation. The nanosilver paste is chosen as the die-attach material as well as playing the key functions of electrically connecting the devices' pads. The electrical characteristics of the SiC-based power semiconductors, SiC JFETs, and SiC Schottky diodes have been measured and compared before and after packaging. No significant changes (<5%) are found in the characteristics of all the devices. Prototype module is fabricated and operated up to 400 V, 1.4 kW at junction temperature of 250 °C in the continuous power test. Thermomechanical robustness has also been investigated by passive thermal cycling of the module from -55 °C to 250 °C. Electrical and mechanical performances of the packaged module are characterized and considered to be reliable for at least 200 cycles. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The paper presents a power electronic conversion system and its control for a fuel cell and a battery-based hybrid drive system for a motor glider. The energy conversion system is designed in such a way that the fuel cell gives power equal to the electric drive power demand for horizontal flight, whereas during motor glider take-off and climbing, the fuel cell is supported by the battery. The paper presents the power demand related to the assumed mission profile, the main components of the hybrid drive system and its holistic structure, and details of power electronics control. Selected stationary experimental test results related to the energy conversion and drive system are shown. Some results related to the aircraft tests on a runway are presented. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]