International Journal of Electrical

Engineering and
Technology
(IJEET), ISSN 0976
6545(Print), ISSN
INTERNATIONAL
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0976 6553(Online) Volume 3, Issue 3, October December (2012), IAEME
& TECHNOLOGY (IJEET)

ISSN 0976 6545(Print)

ISSN 0976 6553(Online)
Volume 3, Issue 3, October - December (2012), pp. 80-88
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IJEET
IAEME

A REVIEW ON CURRENT SOURCE INVERTER FED AC DRIVES

AND MULTILEVEL CURRENT SOURCE INVERTERS: PART -1: CSI
FED AC DRIVES
Vinesh Kapadia1 and Dr.Hina Chandwani2
1
Research Scholar at CHARUSAT, Changa, Gujarat & Assistant Prof. Dept of E.C., VBTIT &
RC, Umrakh, Bardoli, Gujarat, India
2

Associate Professor, Dept of Electrical Engineering, The M.S.University of Baroda,

Vadodara, India
E-mail id: - be_049_11_head@gtu.edu.in, hinachandwani@gmail.com

ABSTRACT
This paper (part-1) presents an overview of the development of Current Source Inverter (CSI)
fed AC Drives. Majority of the AC Drives are based on voltage source inverters, however for
high power, current source inverter fed ac drives do have their advantages. The various
developments that have taken place of more than a decade have been presented. The stages of
developments and recent trends have also been accounted for and a convergence on the future
scope of work along with the second paper (part-2) on combining both domains (multilevel
current source inverter) has been concluded.
Index Terms-- AC Drives, Current Source Inverter (CSI), Induction Motor, PMSM, PWM,
THD, Voltage Source Inverter (VSI)
I. INTRODUCTION
VOLTAGE source inverters are very common and in wide use in ac drives. Though the current
source inverter dates back to earlier than 1988, but was not as widely used as compared to a
voltage source inverter (VSI). An approach here is made to show the advances in CSI fed ac
drives . It later on has been concluded that there remains scope of work for CSI fed PMSM
drives.

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International Journal of Electrical Engineering and Technology (IJEET), ISSN 0976 6545(Print), ISSN
0976 6553(Online) Volume 3, Issue 3, October December (2012), IAEME

II.

ADVANCES IN CSI-DRIVES

TABLE I
Advancements in CSI fed AC Drives
Title

Reference

A modified current source inverter (MCSI) for

a multi induction motor drive system

IEEE Transactions On Power Electronics

Vol. 3, No. 1, Jan 1988

A Current-Source-Inverter-Fed Induction
Motor Drive System with Reduced Losses

IEEE Transactions On Industry Applications,

Vol. 34, No. 4, July/August 1998

A vector-controlled PWM current-sourceinverter-fed IM motor drive with a new stator

current control method

IEEE Transactions On Industrial Electronics,

Vol. 52, NO. 2, APRIL 2005

A novel CSI-fed induction motor drive

IEEE Transactions On Power Electronics,

Vol. 21, No. 4, July 2006

Low-Cost Current-Fed PMSM Drive System

With Sinusoidal Input Currents

IEEE Transactions On Industry Applications,

Vol. 42, No. 3, May/June 2006

Load-Commutated SCR Current-SourceInverter-Fed Induction Motor Drive With

Sinusoidal Motor Voltage and Current

IEEE Transactions On Power Electronics

Vol. 24, No. 4, APRIL 2009

Boost mode test of a current-source-inverterfed permanent magnet synchronous motor

drive for automotive applications

IEEE 12th Workshop Control and Modeling

for Power Electronics (COMPEL), 2010

High Power CSI-Fed IPM drive System

Control with Minimum DC-Link Current

IECON - 36th Annual Conference on IEEE

Industrial Electronics Society, 2010

A current controller design for current source

inverter-fed PMSM drive system

IEEE 8th International Conference, Power

Electronics and ECCE Asia (ICPE & ECCE),
2011

Power Factor Compensation for CSC-fed

PMSM Drive Using d-axis Stator Current
Control

IEEE International Electric Machines &

Drives Conference (IEMDC), 2011

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International Journal of Electrical Engineering and Technology (IJEET), ISSN 0976 6545(Print), ISSN
0976 6553(Online) Volume 3, Issue 3, October December (2012), IAEME

Before the year 2000, not much work was done on CSI fed drives however in 1988 A

modified current source

ource inverter for a multi induction motor drive system [1] was explored in
which the shortcomings to drive only one induction motor was overcome and had the following
features:
1. Simple structure, only six thyristors
2. Strong commutation capabi
capability
3. Lower peak voltage across the commutation capacitors
4. Ability to drive multiple induction motors
5. Easy overcurrent protecti
protection owing to large dc link choke

Fig-1 Modified Current Source Inverter

Fig
After a decade, A Current-Source
Source-Inverter-Fed Induction
tion Motor Drive System with Reduced
Losses [2] was proposed: In which a CSI
CSI-based
based ac induction motor drive topology with a
supplemental CSI modulation index control loop was evolved. The control strategy alloweds
the operation of the inverter at constan
constantt modulation index in steady state, regardless of the load
speed and torque. The strategy achieves this goal by minimizing the steady-state
steady
dc-link
current. In addition to the inherent advantages of the CSI topology

Fig-22 Control scheme of proposed ac CSI drive incoporating modulation index control for
reduced losses (motor control uses the V/f scheme)
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International Journal of Electrical Engineering and Technology (IJEET), ISSN 0976 6545(Print), ISSN
0976 6553(Online) Volume 3, Issue 3, October December (2012), IAEME

The scheme added the following advantages:

1. fixed and reduced motor voltage distortion.
2. minimized dc-bus and switch conduction losses
3. elimination of motor circuit resonances through instantaneous output voltage control.
After 2004, further work was carried out and A vector-controlled PWM current-sourceinverter-fed induction motor drive with a new stator current control method [3] was proposed
in which the control of the PWM-CSI-fed induction motor in the rotor-flux-based reference
was discussed. New methods for compensating the error between the reference and measured
value of the stator current caused by the load filter and for damping the stator current
oscillations, when the stator current references are changed, without feedback variables were
presented. The proposed control methods enabled the elimination of the stator current sensors.

Fig-3 Control system of the PWM-CSI fed induction motor drive

Afterwards A novel CSI-fed induction motor drive [4] was evolved, which experimentally
demonstrated the motor drive with sinusoidal motor current and voltage waveforms.

Fig-4 Functional block diagram of proposed CSI fed drive

The proposed drive resulted in near sinusoidal motor current and voltage waveform in the
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International Journal of Electrical Engineering and Technology (IJEET), ISSN 0976 6545(Print), ISSN
0976 6553(Online) Volume 3, Issue 3, October December (2012), IAEME

entire speed range of the drive including low speed because of the uniform filtering action of
the active filter, moreover the conventional motors could have been retrofitted with
w
the
proposed drive.
In 2006 a Low-Cost
Cost Current
Current-Fed
Fed PMSM Drive System With Sinusoidal Input Currents [5]
was proposed.. Here a new current
current-source
source drive topology for supplying a PMSM was presented
. A drive topology structure with a PWM three
three-phase buck rectifier at its input and to supply a
PMSM with a simple load-commutated
commutated thyristor inverter. It was possible to minimize the
smoothing dc inductor and potentially integrate it into a new type of machine under
development. In addition, having a PWM rectif
rectifier as the front-end
end unit in utility interfaced
systems offered benefits such as improved quality of power drawn from the ac system and
sinusoidally shaped input currents. The poorer output drive characteristics due to the six-step
six
inverter operation and incapability
ncapability of precise positioning and speed control were justified
because the drive system was intended to be used in lowcost HVAC applications or the
appliance industry

Fig
Fig-5 Proposed low - cost PMSM drive
After four years Load-Commutated
Commutated SCR Curr
Current-Source-Inverter-Fed
Fed Induction Motor
Drive With Sinusoidal Motor Voltage and Current [6] was proposed , in which the VSI current
is controlled to continuously adjust the commutation margin of the SCRs in the CSI. The size
of the capacitor used is very small and operation without capacitor is also possible.

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International Journal of Electrical Engineering and Technology (IJEET), ISSN 0976 6545(Print), ISSN
0976 6553(Online) Volume 3, Issue 3, October December (2012), IAEME

Fig-6 Functional block diagram of the proposed load commutated CSI-fed Induction motor
drive
Because of the presence of current loops, vector control is implemented and it is ensured that
active power is always sourced by the CSI. An experimental prototype was developed , the
results showed the feasibility of the control strategy. The scheme is suitable for large power
(multiples of megawatt) applications.
Till date, in 2010 Boost mode test of a current-source-inverter-fed permanent magnet
synchronous motor drive for automotive applications [7] was proposed and a lab- prototype
was developed. By using a dc-dc converter together with the CSI,the output voltage of the CSI
can be boosted. The modified field oriented control scheme for this CSI PMSM drive was
explained and tested in real-time control. The modeling and experimental results show the CSI
can drive the motor to rated speed even at reduced dc source voltage levels.

Fig-7 CSI-fed PMSM drive for HEV

In the same year High Power CSI-Fed IPM drive System Control with Minimum DC-Link
Current [8] was presented, in which, a control scheme for CSI fed IPM drive with dc-link
current reduction strategy was proposed. The control scheme was based on FOC control with
magnet rotor flux orientation. The dc-link current minimization strategy consists of maximum
modulation index control and optimal stator current angle control methods. The maximum
modulation index control was first employed by fixing the CSI inverter modulation index at
ma=1. The dc-link current was further reduced by using a novel stator current angle algorithm.

Fig-8 Block diagram of proposed current source inverter fed IPM drive and its FOC control
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International Journal of Electrical Engineering and Technology (IJEET), ISSN 0976 6545(Print), ISSN
0976 6553(Online) Volume 3, Issue 3, October December (2012), IAEME

scheme
With the proposed control strategy, the drive semiconductor (switches) loss and dc-link
inductor loss can be reduced for a wide motor speed range. The effectiveness was first verified
by Matlab simulation results for high-power medium-voltage motor parameters. Then,
experimental prototype of 10 kW IGCT based current-source drive with interior permanent
magnet motor was used to verify the theoretical analysis and the simulation results. To validate
the effect of the proposed strategy, the results of the proposed strategy were compared with
Maximum Torque Per Ampere control scheme in both simulation and experiment. Both
simulation and experimental results have drawn same relation in term of the dc-link current
minimization for a wide speed range.
A couple of years later A current controller design for current source inverter-fed PMSM
drive system [9] which proposed the current controller design of CSI-fed PMSM drive system
in order to attenuate resonance due to the LC filter. Basically, the CSI-fed drive system was
modeled as a 2nd order system.

Fig-9 Block diagram of CSI-fed a PMSM

Hence a multi-loop current controller design using a pole/zero cancellation method was
proposed with a transfer function matrix. To compensate the cross-coupling term, two types of
controller were implemented using different decoupling method. Additionally, active damping
methods were proposed to enhance the stability of the system. To evaluate the effectiveness of
the proposed current controller, computer simulation and experiment have were performed.
In the same year, Power Factor Compensation for CSC-fed PMSM Drive Using d-axis
Stator Current Control [10] was presented in which A control scheme for PWM CSC-fed
PMSM drive system with input power factor compensation has been proposed. Unlike previous
power factor compensation schemes, the proposed approach is based on the motor d-axis stator
current control in the field oriented control of the drive system and does not require online
modulation scheme for the rectifier and/ or the inverter. As a result, Selective Harmonic
Elimination modulation patterns can be implemented on both rectifier and inverter to minimize
drive switching losses. The effectiveness of the proposed method is first verified by Matlab
simulation for a high-power medium-voltage motor. Then an experimental prototype of 6.5 kW
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International Journal of Electrical Engineering and Technology (IJEET), ISSN 0976 6545(Print), ISSN
0976 6553(Online) Volume 3, Issue 3, October December (2012), IAEME

IGCT based current-source drive with IPM motor is used to verify the theoretical analysis and
the simulation results. Results have shown that with properly designed filter capacitors, the
proposed d-axis stator current can effectively regulate the inputpower factor to be unity in the
entire speed range.

Fig-10 High power medium voltage current - source fed PM drive

III. CONCLUSION
After a thorough review and studying the various papers along with the existing
developments in CSI fed AC Drives there is scope for further work that can be carried out on
CSI fed PMSM drives, The final conclusion is drawn in conjunction with
part-2. The
parameters of the drive can be optimized and an improvement in the performance of the drive
can be obtained.
IV. REFERENCES
[1] Bin Wu, S.B. Dewan, and Paresh C.Sen, A modified current source inverter (MCSI) for a
multi induction motor drive system, IEEE Transactions on Power Electronics Vol. 3, No.
1, Jan 1988, pp. 10-16.
[2] Jose R. Espinoza and Geza Zoos, A Current-Source-Inverter-Fed Induction Motor Drive
System with Reduced Losses, IEEE Transactions on Industry Applications, Vol. 34, No. 4,
July/August 1998, pp. 796-805.
[3] Mika Salo and Heikki Tuusa A Vector-Controlled PWM Current-Source-Inverter-Fed
Induction Motor Drive with a New Stator Current Control Method IEEE Transactions on
Industrial Electronics, Vol. 52, No. 2, April 2005, pp. 523-531
[4] Abdul Rahiman Beig, and V. T. Ranganathan, A Novel CSI-Fed Induction Motor Drive,
IEEE Transactions on Power Electronics, Vol. 21, No. 4, July 2006, pp 1073-1082.
[5] Velimir Nedic, and Thomas A. Lipo, Low-Cost Current-Fed PMSM Drive System With
Sinusoidal Input Currents, IEEE Transactions On Industry Applications, Vol. 42, No. 3,
MAY/JUNE 2006, pp 753-762.
[6] Debmalya Banerjee and V. T. Ranganathan Load-Commutated SCR Current-SourceInverter-Fed Induction Motor Drive With Sinusoidal Motor Voltage and Current, IEEE
Transactions on Power Electronics Vol. 24, No. 4, April 2009 , pp 1048-106,.
[7] Lixin Tang and Gui-Jia Su Boost Mode Test of a Current-Source-Inverter-Fed Permanent
Magnet Synchronous Motor Drive for Automotive Applications, IEEE 12th Workshop
Control and Modeling for Power Electronics (COMPEL), 2010
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International Journal of Electrical Engineering and Technology (IJEET), ISSN 0976 6545(Print), ISSN
0976 6553(Online) Volume 3, Issue 3, October December (2012), IAEME

[8] Ehsan Al-nabi, Bin Wu Vijay Sood Jingya Dai High Power CSI-Fed IPM Drive System
Control with Minimum DC-Link Current, IECON 2010 - 36th Annual Conference on
IEEE Industrial Electronics Society, pp 857-863.
[9] Hak-Jun Lee, Sungho Jung, and Seung-Ki Sul A Current Controller Design for Current
Source Inverter-Fed PMSM Drive System, IEEE 8th International Conference on Power
Electronics - ECCE Asia ), May 30-3 June, 2011, pp 1364-1370.
[10]Ehsan Al-nabi, Bin Wu, Navid Zargari and Vijay Sood Power Factor Compensation for
CSC-Fed PMSM Drive Using d-axis Stator Current Control 2011 IEEE International
Electric Machines & Drives Conference (IEMDC) Niagara Falls, ON, Canada, 15 May - 18
May 2011 pp. 753-758.

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