International Journal of Innovative Research in Advanced Engineering (IJIRAE) ISSN: 2349-2163

Issue 2, Volume 2 (February 2015)

www.ijirae.com

Parallel Active Filter Modelling and control strategy for

harmonic elimination
Hamza Nawar Abdulateef Alobidi *
Electrical department, College Of Technology.
Jeddah. KINDGOM OF SAUDI ARABIA

Marouani Ismail
Electrical department, College Of Technology.
Jeddah. KINDGOM OF SAUDI ARABIA

AbstractIn an electrical network, unbalanced and harmonic currents generated by nonlinear and unbalanced loads
can cause harmonics and unbalanced voltage. These voltage perturbations along with voltage sag can strongly
degrade customer power quality. Nowadays, the active filters such as shunt, is studied as a flexible solution to
compensate all current and voltage perturbations. Therefore, in order to improve power system quality, eliminate the
harmonics and improve the power factor, we have also brought to address the different structures of the parallel
active filter (PAF) with a detailed study which affects both its modeling, its size and its control strategy. The FAP is
simulated on Matlab-Simulink software. A low voltage network supplying non-linear loads, is considered as an
application in this paper. The simulation results show the effectiveness, robustness and good adaptability to network
disruption forthis PAF. The results of simulation study presented in this paper are found quite satisfactory to
eliminate harmonics components from utility current. The shunt active filter is found effective to meet IEEE 519
standard recommendations on harmonics levels.
Keywords parallel active filter , power supply, , total harmonic distorsion, reactive power , power factor ,Pulse
Width Modulation.
I. INTRODUCTION
The increased severity of the harmonic pollution in power systems over the last couple of decades has lead the power
electronics engineers to develop high performance solutions to power quality problems created by power electronic
circuits. This technological development for power quality problems involves parallel active filters. With various
successful some circuit topologies and control strategy, parallel active filters are capable of not only harmonic current
compensation, but also negative sequence current, reactive power, and neutral wire current (zero sequence current)
compensation[1]. Parallel Active filters are also utilized to suppress voltage harmonics and voltage flickering, regulate
load terminal voltages, balance voltages in a power system, and damp resonances. The active filters can be parallel (shunt)
type, series type, and combination of both depending on the type of nonlinear loads and the required functionality [2], [3].
The Parallel Active Filter (PAF), shown in Figure 1[4], is the earliest and most recognized active filter configuration
in the technical literature and it has been utilized in practical applications. Due to the parallel connection to the load, it is
also termed as parallel filter. Parallel active filter is controlled as a current source and it is utilized to inject a
compensating current into the system (to the load), so that its current cancels the harmonic current, the reactive power
current and the unbalanced current components on the AC side of a nonlinear load. When it is employed to three-phase
four-wire systems, The Parallel Active Filter also has the capability of compensating the neutral current (zero sequence
current) component.

Fig 1. PAF implemented as a harmonic compensating current source.

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International Journal of Innovative Research in Advanced Engineering (IJIRAE) ISSN: 2349-2163

Issue 2, Volume 2 (February 2015)
www.ijirae.com
Therefore, with the application of Parallel Active Filter, the current drawn form utility grid becomes harmonic free,
balanced, and in phase with utility voltage, and zero-sequence free in three-phase four-wire systems. The nonlinear load
in the Parallel Active Filter application shown in Figure 1 is presented as a general purpose thyristor rectifier with DC
link inductor for illustration. In fact, PAF is suitable and generally employed for diode/thyristor rectifiers with AC and/or
DC side inductors. Such rectifier loads generally constitute the front-end circuits of systems such as ASDs and UPSs,
which behave as harmonic current generator/source nonlinear loads (inductive loads) [5], [6]. PAF also has the capacity
of damping harmonic resonance between an existing passive filter and the supply impedance[7]. The parallel active
filtering technology is well matured and the Parallel Active Filter performance attributes are attractive such that many
leading power electronic companies manufacture Parallel Active Filters. ABB [8], manufacture PAFs complying with the
harmonic standards of IEEE 519 and EN61000-3-4 for the industrial and domestic applications.
II. PARALLEL ACTIVE FILTER
A. Parallel active filter connection
The active filter can be connected in parallel or in series with the network, we are interested in what follows the
parallel active filter (shunt). In the general case, the current absorbed by the load has an active component (
reactive component (

i i
L

With :

La

Lr

), and a harmonic component (

Lh )

La

La ),

as:

i Lr i Lh

i i

(1)

The Parallel active filter provides reactive and distorting power:

i i
f

Lr

i Lh

(2)

To define the harmonic content of a waveform (or distortion level of a waveform), the term Total Harmonic
Distortion (THD) is used and can be applied to either voltage or current. The THD of current is defined as:
THDi=

(3)

where the Ih is the rms value of the current harmonic components and I1 is the rms value of the fundamental current
component.
The phasor diagram illustrated by the Figure 2 shown the Distorting power D and the power factor PF, that are
respectively given by the equation x and y:

(4)
(5)

Fig 2. Phasor diagram of powers

B. three-phase voltage inverter

An inverter is a converter for supplying an AC load from a DC source. If the source is a continuous voltage source
inverter is called voltage inverter. Fig 3. illustrate the topology of a three-phase voltage inverter.
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International Journal of Innovative Research in Advanced Engineering (IJIRAE) ISSN: 2349-2163

Issue 2, Volume 2 (February 2015)
www.ijirae.com

ik1

ik2

ik3

i
k3

k2

k1
Vd

ic2

ic3

ic1

Vc

k1

Vc

k3

k2

Vc
3

ik

ik

ik3

Load

Fig 3.Three-phase voltage inverter

The commutation of the power switches (IGBT:S1,S2, S3) is reflected by the following equations:

Vc1M S1
V S .V
c 2 M 2 dc
Vc3M S 3

(6)

Vc1
2 1 1 S1
V 1 / 3 1 2 1 S .V
c2

2 dc
Vc 3
1 1 2 S 3

(7)

III. INSTANTANEOUS REACTIVE POWER THEORY

To generate the Harmonic Current Reference, the harmonic current extraction methods utilized in the PAF application
is the Instantaneous Reactive Power Theory. Instantaneous reactive power theory (IRPT) known as Akagi-Nabae
Theory defines the instantaneous real power and instantaneous reactive power in a 3-phase 3-wire system where no
zero-sequence voltage is included. IRPT is utilized to derive the fundamental and harmonic components of load current
via measured line voltages and currents.

, Vs
V
This method exploits the transformation ( , ) to get the real and imaginary powers. Denote by ( s
) and
orthogonal components of the landmark (

( I s , I s )

) associated respectively with voltages (Vs123) for connecting the

parallel active filter and current absorbed by the pollutant loads. The transformation ( , ) can be write the following
relationship of voltage and current:

V s

V s

T
32

V
s1
V s 2

Vs 3

2 1

3

1
2
3
2

1
2

V
s1
V s 2

V s 3

(8)

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International Journal of Innovative Research in Advanced Engineering (IJIRAE) ISSN: 2349-2163

Issue 2, Volume 2 (February 2015)
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I s

Is

L1 2 1
i
L2 3
i
0

L3

T
32

1
2
3
2

1
2
3

i
L1
i L 2

i L 3

( 9)

Where (iL1 , iL2, iL3 ) are the current load and T32 is the transformation 3 phase-2 phase [9].
The instantaneous active power P and imaginary Q are defined by the following relationships

Fig 4. Transformation Model (T32 :3phase to 2 phase) Current voltage for parallel active filter.

V s1 i

P
Q

Vs2 i

L1

1
V s1 V s 2
3

L3

L 2

V s3 i

V s 3 V s1

L2

(10)

L3

VS 2

VS 3 i

L1

(11)

In the landmark ( , ) we can build the following matrix equation:

P 3 V s

Q 2 V
s

Vs
V s

I s

I s

(12)

The active power P and reactive power Q respectively consist of active and reactive fundamental component p ,

q of most these powers respectively include an active harmonic component ~p and a reactive harmonic component q~ :

p
P p ~

~
Q q q

The current harmonics are calculated in the landmark (

(13)

, ) by the following matrix:

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International Journal of Innovative Research in Advanced Engineering (IJIRAE) ISSN: 2349-2163

Issue 2, Volume 2 (February 2015)
www.ijirae.com

i 3 1 V
i 2 V

h
h

V S p
q
V s

(14)

V S2 V S2
We can separate the current in the (

, ) we get:
VS p 3 1 VS

VS 0 2 VS

I s 3 1 VS
I

s 2 VS

(15)

VS p
VS q

VS 0 3 1 VS

VS q 2 Vs

(16)

The transition to the phase marker is carried out by the following matrix:

i re f 1

2 1
i re f 2 3 2

1
i re f 3
2

3
2

2
0

i re f

i
ref

(17)

With iref and iref perturbation currents calculated in the () from reactive currents and harmonic currents of the relation
(14)
IV. SIMULATION RESULTS
The active power filter was implemented with matlab simulink . the supply grid line-to-neutral voltage VS was 230 V
(RMS) and the filter capacitor voltage VC was controlled to 980v V, tested on a non linear load model. the inverter
output filter Lf= 2mH and CF = 10 F. the pulse width modulation technique (PWM) used with switching frequency fd
= 12 KHz and coefficient setting rmax = 0.8.
6

Load current (iL1, iL2, iL3) [A]

-2

-4

-6

0.01

0.02

0.03

0.04

0.05
0.06
Time (s)

0.07

0.08

0.09

0.1

Fig 5. Non linear Load current

50
is1
is2
is3

Source current (is1, is2, is3) [A]

40
30
20
10
0
-10
-20
-30
-40

0.01

0.02

0.03

0.04

0.05
0.06
Time (s)

0.07

0.08

0.09

0.1

Fig 6. Source current

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International Journal of Innovative Research in Advanced Engineering (IJIRAE) ISSN: 2349-2163

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40
iF1
iF2
iF3

Filter current (iF1,iF2,iF3) [A]

30
20
10
0
-10
-20
-30
-40

0.01

0.02

0.03

0.04

0.05
0.06
Times (s)

0.07

0.08

0.09

0.1

Fig 7. Current generated by the parallel active filter

Fig 8, Fig 9 and Fig 10 chown that the parallel active filter with inverter three phase gave results within acceptable
limits standards the harmonic distortion that does not exceed 5% and reactive power is almost nil after compensation,
three network current are sinusoidal and balanced.the power factor is improved .

Peak Magnitude Spectrum of load current

M a g n it u d e h a rm o n ic

5
4
3
2
1
0
0

8
10
12
Order of Harmonic

14

16

18

Fig 8. Peak magnitude spectrum of the load current with Total harmonic distortion THDi=16.42%

Peak Magnitude Spectrum of source current

M a g n itu d e h a rm o n ic

5
4
3
2
1
0
0

8
10
12
Order of Harmonic

14

16

18

Fig 9. Peak magnitude spectrum of the source current with Total harmonic distortion THDi=1.38%

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International Journal of Innovative Research in Advanced Engineering (IJIRAE) ISSN: 2349-2163

Issue 2, Volume 2 (February 2015)
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400
vs1
is1

300

is1(A),vs1 (V)

200
100
0
-100
-200
-300
-400

0.02

0.04

0.06

0.08

0.1

0.12

0.14

0.16

0.18

0.2

Time (s)

Fig 10. Current and source voltage

1200
1000

DC bus voltage

800
600
400
200
0
-200
-400

0.1

0.2

0.3

0.4

0.5
0.6
Time (s)

0.7

0.8

0.9

Fig 11. Voltage across capacitor

The fig 11 shows the robustness of the control loop of the regulation system included in this parallel active filter.
V. CONCLUSIONS
In this paper, the connection of a parallel active filter, its modeling and its control strategy and the harmonic
identification portion are well developed. the characteristics of the harmonics producing nonlinear loads and the
application consideration of the PAF to these loads are analyzed . Actually, Parallel active filters are presented as a
modern solution; they provide the answer to all the disadvantages of passive filters and have the advantage of being in
combination with other active filter and / or hybrid passive again with a more efficient manner. The different simulation
results also show that the parallel active filter is able to decrease the harmonic levels within acceptable limits for a nonlinear load and therefore improving the power factor and compensation of reactive power which allows clean up the grid
by improving the quality of electrical energy which is always requested.
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[3] B. Singh, K. Al-Haddad, A. Chandra, A review of active filters for power quality improvement, IEEE
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[4] HASAN. ZKAYA.Prallel active filter design, control and implementation.Thsis.June-2007.
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September/October 2001.
[6] S. Bhattacharya, High power active filter systems, Ph. D. Dissertation, University of Wisconsin-Madison, 2003.
[7] H. Fujita, H. Akagi, The unified power quality conditioner: The integration of series- and shunt-active filters,
IEEE Transactions on Industrial Electronics, Vol. 13, No. 2, pp. 315-322, March 1998.
[8] David Nedeljkovi, Mitja Nemec, Vanja Ambroi. Application of Direct Current Control in a Three-phase
Parallel Active Power Filter. Elektrotehniki vestnik 76(3):85-91, 2009.
[9] Mansour.S,Etude dun filtre shunt en rgime dsiquilibr-ESST-Janvier 2008.
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