2019 10th International Power Electronics, Drive Systems and Technologies Conference (PEDSTC)

12-14 February, Shiraz University, Iran

Control Strategy of a Single Phase Active Power Filter

with Adjustable DC Link Capacitor Voltage for THD
Reduction in Non-linear Loads
Amin Talebkhah Milad Samady Shadlu*
Department of Electrical and Electronic Engineering North Department of Electrical and Electronic Engineering, Young
Khorasan Science and Research Branch, Islamic Azad Researchers and Elite Club, Bojnourd Branch, Islamic Azad
University University
Bojnourd, Iran Bojnourd, Iran
Amintlk@yahoo.com Milad.Samady@yahoo.com

Seyyed Majid Fatemi

Department of Electrical and Electronic Engineering
Islamic Azad University, Bojnourd Branch
Bojnourd, Iran
Majid.fatemi95@yahoo.com

Abstract - The presence of nonlinear and unbalanced loads in
the single phase networks increases the harmonics and losses in
power grid. The active power filters solve these problems, and in
addition to reducing any arbitrary harmonic component, it will
eliminate the possibility of resonance with the network. In this
paper, an active power filter (APF) based on voltage source
converter (VSC) is used to reduce the THD contents of single
phase grid current which are applied to a non-linear load. A new
hybrid hysteresis current control scheme with a DC link capacitor
voltage regulator based on conventional PI controller is proposed
to generate the gating signals of APF. The performance of the
proposed controller in terms of reducing the THD contents of
grid current and power quality improvement is evaluated using
MATLAB/Simulink and also an experimental setup is
implemented to confirm the simulation results.
Index Terms - Active Power Filter, Hysteresis Current Control,
DC Link Capacitor Voltage Regulator, THD Content Reduction.
I. INTRODUCTION
The presence of the nonlinear loads in single phase low
power grids may considerably challenges the power quality of
the grid. These nonlinear loads add the harmonic contents to
the source current [1]. Such components of the current have
undesirable effects, such as increasing the losses in
transmission lines and electrical machines, oscillating torque in
ac machines, increasing the power ripples in rectifiers,
incorrect operation of power equipment, saturation of
transformers and lower total network capacity. Concepts such
as power quality and reactive power compensation for single
phase systems have become more common in recent years [2].
Different methods for improving the power factor, eliminating
the harmonics and the reactive power compensation have been
presented in literature [3-6]. These methods typically use
single-phase voltage source inverters as an active power filter
(APF) powered by a DC link capacitor and operating in
current control mode to track the reference value [7, 8].
The connection of nonlinear loads to the networks with
internal impedance will cause harmonics and voltage drop and
ultimately lead to losses [9]. By placing a harmonic current
source in parallel with the nonlinear load, the harmonics
needed for the load can be generated on the load side [10].
These harmonic currents are supplied by the active power
filter, which includes a PWM inverter [11, 12]. The main
structure of the active power filter has several problems, such
as generating the additional network harmonics and the
reactive power consumption. In order to optimally exploit the
active filter, various control methods are presented in
literatures [13, 14].
The hysteresis current control method has recently been
introduced as an efficient method in literatures [15]. Hysteresis
current controller and integrative-proportional (PI) control for
a three-phase active power filter are proposed in [16] to
improve the power quality of nonlinear loads. The gating
signals associated with the shunt active power filter are
generated using a hysteresis current control based on Pulse
Width Modulation (PWM) technique.
In this paper, a hysteresis current control method is used
to control the output current of a single phase active power
filter, which also uses a DC link capacitor voltage regulator
based on conventional PI controller. The advantage of the
proposed hybrid control method is simple configuration and
reducing the THD content of the grid current considerably
compared to the conventional HCC method without DC
capacitor voltage regulation. Also, power quality improvement
is achieved using the proposed controller.
The paper is organized as follows. Section 2 describes the
single phase APF and the conventional HCC method to control
it. The proposed hybrid control scheme is presented in Section
3 and the details of the current control and DC link capacitor
voltage regulation are discussed. Simulation results and the
comparisons of the conventional HCC method and the

978-1-5386-9254-7/19/$31.00 ©2019 IEEE

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proposed hybrid HCC method in terms of THD content
reduction and power quality improvement are given in Section
4. Experimental results are presented in Section 5. Finally, the
last section draws conclusions.
II. SINGLE PHASE APF CONFIGURATION AND THE
CONVENTIONAL HCC METHOD
A. Single Phase Active Power Filter
In this paper, the voltage source converter (VSC) is used
as an active power filter. Fig. 1 shows the topology of the
single phase active power filter along with the nonlinear load.
where, Vdc is DC link voltage, Lf is the inductance between
APF and the grid, fs is switching frequency and vs is the source
voltage. Also, m=dis/dt where is is the source current. The
basis of the performance of the hysteresis current control
method is based on the difference between the measured
current of the compensator and the reference compensation
current, which is calculated from conventional methods such
as single phase PQ theory [20]. The general block diagram of
conventional HCC method is shown in Figure 3.
Actual Current
Reference Current
Hysteresis Band Upper Band
Lower Band

This configuration consists of a parallel diode bridge rectifier

with an ohmic reactance as a nonlinear load and a VSC as a
compensator for harmonic components and reactive power
compensation. In order to ensure that the pure sinusoidal
currents flow through the source side, the active power filter
has to generate the harmonic power and the reactive power
absorbed by the load and only the constant active power is Fig. 2 Concept of hysteresis current control method
supplied by the source.
is iL The gating signals are generated for each APF switches
Source based on the difference between measured and reference
Nonlinear
compensation currents as follows [21]:
Load
Rs Ls
Rf • If i f < (i ref
f − HB) then, the upper switch of phase j is
if
Lf OFF and the lower switch is ON.
T1a T1b +

• If i f > (i ref
f − HB) then, the upper switch of phase j is
Cdc Vdc
ON and the lower switch is OFF.
T2 a T2 b
_ where, HB is the hysteresis bandwidth which is calculated
Active Power Filter
based on (1).
Fig. 1 Single phase APF based on VSC with nonlinear load
i ref
f − if ≥
Gating SUpper
B. Conventional Hysteresis Current Control Signals
≤ S Lower
HB −1
The hysteresis current control method has fast tracking
capability without delaying the reference current, as well as the Fig. 3 Block diagram of the conventional hysteresis current controller
simplicity of implementation. It is also better than other
control algorithms in terms of the accuracy of reference C. Reference Current Calculation Method
current tracking [17, 18]. Hysteresis current control is a
commonly used PWM method used for power converters and In this paper, single phase PQ theory is used to calculate
uses them as a current source in the system. In this paper, the the reference current components of APF [20]. This method
HCC model is used to control the active power filter based on operates based on the calculation of the instantaneous space
VSC as depicted in Figure 2. The hysteresis current controller vector representation of PCC voltage and load current and
generates gating signals for VSC switches by comparing the decomposition of real and imaginary parts of them. Next, the
measured grid currents with the reference values. The single-phase instantaneous active and reactive power
controller generates the gating signals for APF such that the components are obtained by decomposing the real and
imaginary parts of single-phase instantaneous complex power,
real currents injected to the grid are maintained within the
respectively. Finally, the reference current component for APF
desired hysteresis band (HB), as depicted in Fig. 2. According
is calculated as follows [20]:
to [19], the HB is calculated using (1) as follows:
v' ( t )2 i( t ) − v( t )v' ( t )i' ( t )
  4 L2  vs  
2  i ref
f (t ) = = Re{iC ( t )} (2)
 0.12Vdc 1 − v( t )2 + v' ( t )2
 + m  
f
HB =  (1)
 Vdc2  Lf  
 fsL f     


607
 where, v(t) and i(t) are the PCC voltage and load current iL i' L
components and v'(t) and i'(t) represent their π/2 phase leaded π/2 Phase Lead

values, respectively. ×
The block diagram of the single phase PQ theory is _

illustrated in Fig. 4 [20]. v PCC v' PCC +

π/2 Phase Lead
× ×
+ i ref
f
iL
π/2 Phase Lead
i' L u2
+
÷ +
+

×
Vdcref PI
p dc × ÷
+ Controller
_ −

v PCC v' PCC + DC Link Voltage Regulator

Vdc
π/2 Phase Lead
×+ × Fig. 5 Block diagram of the modified single phase PQ theory by adding DC
i ref link voltage regulator
u2
+
÷ f

iL i' L
π/2 Phase Lead
Fig. 4 Conventional single phase PQ theory [20] ×
_
v PCC v' PCC +
III. PROPOSED HYBRID HYSTERESIS CURRENT CONTROLLER π/2 Phase Lead
× ×
+
i ref
+
÷ f

In the proposed hybrid HCC method, the DC link u2 +

+
if i ref −if
capacitor voltage regulation is added in order to regulate the p dc × ÷
f ≥
Gating SUpper
Vdcref PI

capacitor voltage and eliminate the fluctuations of the DC link is Signals

+ Controller
≤ S Lower
− Vdc HB −1
vs
voltage. According to [20], the single-phase instantaneous Vdc DC Link Voltage Regulator

active and reactive power components can be written as Fig. 6 Block diagram of the proposed hybrid HCC method
follows:
 p( t )  v( t ) v' ( t ) i( t )  IV. SIMULATION RESULTS
 =   (3)
q( t )  − v' ( t ) v( t )  i' ( t ) In this section, a single phase system with a nonlinear load
Instantaneous reactive power compensation using single- based on Fig. 1 is implemented in MATLAB/Simulink. The
phase PQ theory can be formulated as the following equation simulation parameters are given in Table 1. The conventional
based on [20]: HCC and the proposed hybrid HCC methods are applied to
control an APF based on VSC and their performance is
i( t )  1  v( t ) − v' ( t ) 0  compared in terms of THD content reduction and power
i' ( t ) = 2 2 v' ( t ) v( t )  q( t )
(4) quality improvement. The current controllers based on two
  v( t ) + v' ( t )  mentioned schemes are activated in t=0.2s. The source current
By adding the DC link regulation, a DC power waveform using conventional and proposed hysteresis current
component, pdc(t), is defined which has to be compensated like controllers are depicted in Fig. 7 (a) and (b), respectively. The
q(t). So, equation (4) can be rewritten as below: injected current waveform by the active power filter using
conventional and the proposed hybrid HCC schemes is
i( t )  1  v( t ) − v' ( t )  p dc ( t ) illustrated in Fig. 8 (a) and (b), respectively. Also the active
i' ( t ) = 2 v' ( t ) v( t )    (5) and reactive power components are shown in Fig. 9.
  v( t ) + v' ( t )2   q( t ) 
TABLE I
Eventually, by considering the real part of iC(t), i.e. i(t), as SIMULATION PARAMETERS
the reference compensation current and according to (5), we Parameter Value
have:
Line to Line Source Voltage (vs) 230 V (rms)
2
v' ( t ) i( t ) − v( t )v' ( t )i' ( t ) v( t ) p dc ( t ) Supply Frequency (f) 50 Hz
i ref
f (t ) = + (6)
v( t )2 + v' ( t ) 2 v( t ) 2 + v' ( t ) 2 Switching Frequency (fs) 35 kHz
The conventional single phase PQ theory is modified Reference of the DC Link Voltage (Vdc) 400 V
based on (6) and depicted in Fig. 5. In this model, the DC link Source Side Resistance (Rs) 0.1 Ω
voltage is compared with the reference value, and their
difference will be added as a DC active power component Source Side Inductance (Ls) 0.01 mH
(pdc), as it can be seen in Fig. 5. So, the total block diagram of Filter Resistance (Rf) 0.01 Ω
the proposed hybrid HCC method can be implemented as Fig.
Filter Inductance (Lf) 3 mH
6.

608
 (a) (a)
Active and Reactive Power Components of the ac Grid
4000

3000

2000 Active Power [W]

Reactive Power [Var]
1000

-1000
0.1 0.12 0.14 0.16 0.18 0.2 0.22 0.24 0.26 0.28 0.3
Time [s]
(b)
(b)
Fig. 9 Active and reactive power components of the ac grid using (a)
Fig. 7 The source current waveform using (a) conventional HCC (b) proposed
conventional HCC (b) proposed hybrid HCC
hybrid HCC
APF Current
50
40
30 THD=6.11% THD=2.86%
20
10
0
-10
-20
-30
-40
-50
0.1 0.12 0.14 0.16 0.18 0.2 0.22 0.24 0.26 0.28 0.3
Time [s]
(a) (b ) (a )

Fig. 10 THD content of the source current using (a) proposed hybrid HCC
method (b) conventional HCC method

As shown in Fig. 10, the THD content of the source

(b)
Fig. 8 The injected current by the APF using (a) conventional HCC (b)
proposed hybrid HCC
As it can be seen in Figs. 7 and 8, the source current can
be effectively controlled by two controllers but the results of
the proposed hybrid HCC method is better in terms of THD
content. Also, the active and reactive power components in
Fig. 9 indicate the better performance of the proposed
controller in terms of power quality improvement. The
fluctuations of the active power are more effectively
eliminated using the proposed HCC compared to the
conventional method. Also, the reactive power compensation
is effectively done utilizing the proposed method. For a better
comparison, the THD content of the source current using two
controllers is depicted in Fig. 10.
current is reduced using the proposed method compared to the
conventional method. This proves the performance of the
proposed controller in reducing the THD content.
Furthermore, the DC link voltage using two controllers is
illustrated in Fig. 11. Obviously, the DC link capacitor voltage
is perfectively regulated based on the reference value, i.e.
400V, using the proposed hybrid HCC method compared to
the conventional HCC scheme.
IV. EXPERIMENTAL RESULTS
In order to confirm the performance of the proposed
hybrid HCC controller in terms of THD reduction at the source
side, an experimental setup is made in the lab which consists
of a single phase APF based on VSC and a nonlinear load that
is supplied by the main grid. Fig. 12 shows the mentioned
experimental setup. Also, the parameters of the experimental
setup are given in Table 2.

609
 (a) Fig. 13 The constructed avtive power filter setup

30 A

(b) Fig. 14 The nonlinear load current

Fig. 11 The DC link voltage using (a) conventional HCC (b) proposed hybrid
HCC

Fig . 15 FFT analysis and THD content of the nonlinear load current

Fig. 12 Experimental setup

TABLE II
EXPERIMENTAL PARAMETERS
Parameter Value 30 A
Supply Voltage (vs) 230 V (rms)
Supply Frequency (f) 50 Hz
Fig. 16 The source current waveform using conventional HCC controller
Switching Frequency (fs) 35 kHz
Reference of the DC Link Voltage (Vdc) 400 V
Filter Resistance (Rf) 0.01 Ω
Filter Inductance (Lf) 3 mH
DC Link Capacitor (Cdc) 5000 μF
Microcontroller Model dsPIC30F4011

The constructed single phase active power filter is shown

in Fig. 13. Also, the experimental results are presented in Figs.
14 to 19. As shown in Fig. 15, the THD content of the
nonlinear load current is equal to 112.7% which is a terrific
value in single phase low power applications. The source
current by applying the conventional HCC method to generate
the gating signals of the APF is illustrated in Fig. 16.
Furthermore, the FFT analysis and THD content of the source
current in this situation is shown in Fig. 17.
Fig. 17 FFT analysis and THD content of the source current using
conventional HCC controller
According to Fig. 17, it can be seen that the THD content
of the source current is equal to 15% when the conventional
HCC controller is utilized to control the APF. Next, the
proposed hybrid HCC controller is applied to control the APF
under the same conditions and the source current and FFT

610
analysis in this case are presented in Figs. 18 and 19,
respectively. It is seen that the THD content of the source
current is considerably reduced using proposed hybrid HCC
controller (11.7%) compared to the conventional HCC scheme
(15%). This result is also consistent with the simulation
results. The proposed hybrid HCC method can effectively
reduce the ripples of the DC link voltage by regulating it
through the additional controller. So, the harmonic content of
the source current will be decreased by regulating the DC link
voltage.
30 A
Fig. 18 The source current waveform using the proposed hybrid HCC
controller
Fig. 19 FFT analysis and THD content of the source current using the
proposed hybrid HCC controller
V. CONCLUSIONS
In this paper, a single phase activate power filter based on
voltage source converter is intended to compensate the
harmonic content in a single phase grid which feeds a
nonlinear load. The proposed control method for this active
power filter is a hybrid hysteresis current control that generates
the gating signals for switches of APF based on real and
reference currents difference. Also, an extra DC link voltage
regulator based on PI controller is added to the reference
current calculator to regulate the DC link voltage and improve
the performance of the proposed controller in terms of
reducing the THD content of the source current. Comparing
the results of the proposed controller with the conventional
HCC controller indicates its superior performance in
controlling the active power filter and also reducing the ripple
of the DC link voltage and THD content of the source current.
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