A Model Predictive Current Control Method

for Voltage Source Inverters to Reduce

Common-Mode Voltage
with Improved Load Current Performance

Huu-Cong Vu and Hong-Hee Lee(&)

School of Electrical Engineering, University of Ulsan, Ulsan, South Korea

vuhuucong90@gmail.com, hhlee@mail.ulsan.ac.kr

Abstract. This paper presents a new model predictive current control (MPCC)
method in order to reduce common-mode voltage (CMV) for a three-phase
voltage source inveter (VSI). By utilizing twenty-one vectors instead of eight
vectors used in the conventional MPCC method,the proposed MPCC method can
not only reduce the CMV but also improve load current performance. Simulation
results are given to verify the effectiveness of the proposed MPCC method.

Keywords: Common-mode voltage
Model predictive control
Voltage

source inverters

1 Introduction

Three-phase voltage source inverters (VSIs) have been widely employed in AC motor
drive systems [1]. However, the common-mode voltage (CMV) generated by fast
switching operation of the VSI is a main source of early motor-winding failure and
bearing deterioration. Thus, the reduction of the CMV is important to increase the
motor life time. In general, there are two solotions to solve the CMV problems for VSI:
hardware and software solutions. The hardware solution is achieved with the aid of the
aditional devices such as the isolation transformers, passive filters, and active-
cancerlers [2, 3]. However, this solution resulted in increasing in inverter volume,
weight, and cost. Whereas, the software solution such as PWM methods and predictive
control methods, which does not need to use the additional power devices. Sev-
eral PWM methods have been proposed to reduce the CMV of the VSI by avoiding the
use of zero vectors because the zero vectors produce the highest CMV [4, 5]. Due to the
lack of using zero vectors, the performance of these PWM methods become
deteriorated.
The predictive control method is a computer control algorithm, which consists of
model predictive control and dedbeat control. Recently, the model predictive current
control (MPCC) method is prefer to use due to its advanced characteristics such as
simplicity, control flexibility and good performance. Therefore, the MPCC method has
been received many considerations for the power converters and the drive applications
[6–12].

© Springer International Publishing Switzerland 2016

D.-S. Huang et al. (Eds.): ICIC 2016, Part III, LNAI 9773, pp. 637–647, 2016.
DOI: 10.1007/978-3-319-42297-8_59
638 H.-C. Vu and H.-H. Lee

In the MPCC method, the cost function is designed with a CMV constraint of the
CMV reduction. The amount of CMV reduction is decided by an appropriate weighting
factor [13]. However, the selection of the weighting factor is not easy due to the lack of
theoretical design procedure. In order to solve this problem, two reduced CMV MPCC
methods without the selection of the weighting factor are presented in [14]. These
methods utilize two active vectors in one sampling period that can reduce the CMV as
much as 66.7 % compared to the conventional method. However, they result in
complicated and burden computation for switching times.
To overcome this drawback, this paper proposes a new MPCC method to reduce
the CMV by generating twenty-one virtual vectors with the fixed dwell-time from six
original active vectors. Thus, the proposed method can reduce the CMV without the
switching time calculation. Moreover, the proposed method also can improve the load
current quality by selecting the nearest vectors to synthesize the reference current.
Simulation results are provided to validate the proposed MPCC method.

2 Conventional Model Predictive Current Control

Figure 1 shows a common three-phase VSI topology which includes six insulated gate
bipolar transistor (IGBT) fed by a DC-link voltage.

S1 S3 S5
a
R L
Vdc b n
R L
c
R L
S4 S6 S2

Fig. 1. Three-phase voltage source inverter.

The VSI output phase voltages with a general three-phase inductive load can be
written as:

dia
van ¼ Ria þ L
dt
dib
vbn ¼ Rib þ L ð1Þ
dt
dic
vcn ¼ Ric þ L
dt
where R and L are the load resistance and inductance, respectively.
 A MPCC Method for VSI to Reduce CMV with Improved LCP 639

The space vector of the output voltages is defined as follows:

2
v ¼ ðvan þ vbn ejð2p = 3Þ þ vcn ejð4p = 3Þ Þ ð2Þ
3

The output voltage vector v is determined by the switching states of the VSI and
DC-link voltage Vdc, as given in Eq. (3):

2
v ¼ Vdc ðSa þ Sb ejð2p = 3Þ þ Sc ejð4p = 3Þ Þ; ð3Þ
3
where the switching states Sa , Sb , and Sc are defined as follows:

1 if S4 off and S1 on
Sa ¼ ð4Þ
0 if S1 off and S4 on

1 if S6 off and S3 on
Sb ¼ ð5Þ
0 if S3 off and S6 on

1 if S2 off and S5 on
Sc ¼ ð6Þ
0 if S5 off and S2 on

In general, the three-phase VSI can produce eight voltage vectors, including six
active vectors and two zero vectors as shown in Fig. 2, to control the load current [6].

V3[010] V2[110]

V0[000]
V4[011] V1[100]
V7[111]

V5[001] V6[101]

Fig. 2. Space vector diagram of voltage source inverter.

The space vector of the load current is defined as follows:

2
i ¼ ðia þ ib ejð2p = 3Þ þ ic ejð4p = 3Þ Þ ð7Þ
3
640 H.-C. Vu and H.-H. Lee

Fig. 3. The algorithm of MPCC method.

Substituting (2) and (7) into (1), we obtain:

di
v ¼ Ri þ L ð8Þ
dt

The derivative of the load current in the continuous-time model in (8) can be
approximated by the basis of the first-order approximation with a sampling period Ts
as:

di iðk þ 1Þ  iðkÞ
¼ ð9Þ
dt Ts

By substituting Eq. (9) into Eq. (8), the load current dynamics can then be
expressed in the discrete-time domain as:

Ts
iðk þ 1Þ ¼ iðkÞ þ ½vðkÞ  RiðkÞ; ð10Þ
L
where v(k) and iðkÞ are the load voltage and current vectors at instant k, respectively.
 A MPCC Method for VSI to Reduce CMV with Improved LCP 641

Table 1. Peak value of CMV

Type Switching Voltage vectors |vcm|
states
Sa Sb Sc
Zero vectors 0 0 0 V0 Vdc/2
1 1 1 V7 Vdc/2
Active vectors 1 0 0 V1 Vdc/6
1 1 0 V2 Vdc/6
0 1 0 V3 Vdc/6
0 1 1 V4 Vdc/6
0 0 1 V5 Vdc/6
1 0 1 V6 Vdc/6

According to (10), the seven future load currents iðk þ 1Þ can be predicted by seven
voltage vectors of the VSI, vðkÞ. These seven future load currents, iðk þ 1Þ, are used to
determine the optimal voltage vector that minimizes following cost function:
   
g ¼ ia ðk þ 1Þ  iref  þ ib ðk þ 1Þ  iref  ð11Þ
a b

The algorithm of MPCC method is shown in Fig. 3 and can be summarized as

follows [6]:
(1) The value of the reference current iref is obtained and the load current iðkÞ is
measured.
(2) The model of the VSI is used to predict the value of the load current at the next
sampling instant (k + 1).
(3) The cost function is used to evaluate the error between the reference and the
predicted current in the next sampling interval for each voltage vector.
(4) The optimal voltage vector, which minimizes the current error, is determined
among seven voltage vectors and the corresponding switching states are generated.

3 Proposed MPCC to Reduce CMV and Load Current

Harmonics

In general, the CMV of the three-phase VSI is defined as follows:

ðva0 þ vb0 þ vc0 Þ

vcm ¼ ð12Þ
3
where va0 , vb0 , vc0 are the output phase voltages with respect to the neutral point
(Fig. 1).
642 H.-C. Vu and H.-H. Lee

V3[010] V23 V2[110]

V34 V363 V12

V252
V14
V144 V141
V4[011] V1[100]
V25 V36

V255 V366
V45 V61

V5[001] V56 V6[101]

Fig. 4. Virtual space vectors.

Table 2. Construction of virtual small vectors

Virtual small vectors Combined |vcm|
active states
V141 [100] [011] Vdc/6
V144 [100] [011] Vdc/6
V252 [110] [001] Vdc/6
V255 [110] [001] Vdc/6
V363 [010] [101] Vdc/6
V366 [010] [101] Vdc/6

As can be seen, the zero vectors produce higher CMV that corresponds to Vdc = 2,
whereas the active vectors produce smaller CMV that corresponds to Vdc = 6 as
shown in Table 1.
In order to reduce the CMV, only six active vectors are considered to implement the
predictive current control method. However, the current ripple is increased due to the
absence of the zero vectors. In order overcome this problem, the proposed MPCC
utilizes twenty-one vectors that include six active vectors and fifteen virtual vectors
constructed from six active vectors which produce the smaller CMV that corresponds
to Vdc = 6. By using twenty-one vectors instead of six active vectors, the distance
between the predicted currents and the reference current is decreased, and the reference
tracking error is reduced. Fifteen virtual vectors can be divided into three groups as
below:
(1) Group I consists of virtual small vectors
(2) Group II consists of virtual medium vectors
(3) Group III consists of virtual zero vectors
The methods, used to produce these virtual vectors, are described as follow:
 A MPCC Method for VSI to Reduce CMV with Improved LCP 643

Fig. 5. Implementation of (a) virtual small vector V141. (b) virtual small vector V144.

The virtual small vectors are constructed by two opposite active vectors with three
over four and one over four of the sampling interval, respectively as shown in Table 2.
For example, V141 vector is constructed by applying V1 three over four of the sampling
interval, V4 one over four of the sampling interval as shown in Fig. 5(a). V144 vector is
constructed by applying V1 one over four of the sampling interval, V4 three over four of
the sampling interval as shown in Fig. 5(b).
The virtual medium vectors are constructed by two adjacent active vectors with the
same dwell time, as shown in Table 3. For example, V12 vector is constructed by
applying V1 in half of the sampling interval, and V2 is applied in half of the sampling
interval as shown in Fig. 6.

Table 3. Construction of virtual medium vectors

Virtual medium vectors Combined |vcm|
active states
V12 [100] [110] Vdc/6
V23 [110] [010] Vdc/6
V34 [010] [011] Vdc/6
V45 [011] [001] Vdc/6
V56 [001] [101] Vdc/6
V61 [101] [100] Vdc/6

Fig. 6. Implementation of virtual medium vector V12.

The virtual zero vectors are constructed by two opposite active vectors with the
same dwell time, as shown in Table 4. For example, V14 vector is constructed by
applying V1 in half of the sampling interval, and V4 is applied in half of the sampling
interval as shown in Fig. 7.
644 H.-C. Vu and H.-H. Lee

Table 4. Construction of virtual zero vectors

Virtual zero vectors Combined |vcm|
active states
V14 [100] [011] Vdc/6
V25 [110] [001] Vdc/6
V36 [010] [101] Vdc/6

Fig. 7. Implementation of virtual zero vector V14.

4 Simulation Results

In order to verify the effectiveness of the proposed predictive current control, some
numerical simulations have been carried out by using PSIM 9.0. The simulation
parameters are given as follows:
– DC-link Voltage: 200 V
– Sampling time: Ts = 50 µs
– Three-phase R-L load: R = 10 Ω, L = 20 mH
– Output frequency: f0 = 50 Hz
– Amplitude of reference current: I ref = 6 A
Figure 8(a) shows the CMV waveform of the VSI when the conventional MPCC
method is applied. The peak value of the CMV is achieved 100 V corresponding with

Common-mode voltage 30V/div 10ms/div

Common-mode voltage 30V/div 10ms/div

Fig. 8. Common-mode voltage of: (a) Conventional MPCC method. (b) Proposed MPCC
method.
 A MPCC Method for VSI to Reduce CMV with Improved LCP 645

Vdc = 2. Figure 8(b) shows the CMV waveform of the VSI when the proposed MPCC
method is utilized. From Fig. 8, the proposed MPCC method reduces the peak value of
CMV: the peak of the CMV decreases from 100 V to 33.33 V. As can be seen, the
proposed MPCC method reduces the peak value of the CMV to 66.7 % compare with
conventional MPCC method.
The waveforms of the load currents of conventional MPCC method and the pro-
posed MPCC method are shown in Figs. 9(a) and (b), respectively. Total harmonic
distortion (THD) of the load current with the conventional MPCC is 1.61 %, while that
with the proposed MPCC is 1.2 %. It is obvious that the load currents performance of
the proposed MPCC method is better than that of the conventional MPCC method.

Load current THD =1.61%

5A/div 10ms/div

Load current THD =1.2%

5A/div 10ms/div

Fig. 9. Three-phase load currents of: (a) Conventional MPCC method. (b) Proposed MPCC
method.

3.5
Conventional MPCC method
THD of Load current [%]

3 Proposed MPCC method

2.5

1.5

0.5

0
3.5 4 4.5 5 5.5 6 6.5
Amplitude of reference current [A]

Fig. 10. Comparative results in THD of load currents.

646 H.-C. Vu and H.-H. Lee

Figure 10 shows the THDs of the conventional and proposed MPCC corresponding
to the amplitude of the reference current. From Figs. 9 and 10, we can say that the
proposed MPCC method also improves the load current performance compare to the
conventional MPCC method.

5 Conclusion

This paper has presented a MPCC method that can reduce the CMV as well as improve
the load current performance for the VSI. The proposed MPCC method is generated
twenty-one virtual vectors, which restrict the peak value of the CMV to 66.7 %
compared to the conventional MPCC method with eight original vectors. The proposed
MPCC method also can reduce the load current distortion due to the reference current
tracking error is reduced by using the virtual vectors. Simulated results are provided to
confirm the performance of the proposed MPCC method.

Acknowledgment. This work was supported by the National Research Foundation of Korea
Grant funded by the Korean Government (NRF- 2015R1D1A1A09058166).

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