Power Electronics-Multilevel- ac Drives

Chapter 1 Introduction

1.1 Research Background:

The electronic systems and power electronics have underwent speedy modifications and
changes in the last three decades. As a result of these rapid changes their usage has been
increased and the major reason behind such changes and increased usages is the advancement
and developments in microprocessor technologies and semiconductor devices. VSI (Voltage
Source Inverter) fed drives are frequently used in low and medium power applications and
are not utilized in applications consuming high power (Srivastava and Tripathi, 2011). For
high power consuming applications and medium –voltage Current Source Inverter (CSI) fed
motors are frequently used because the advantages of using CSI are they are reliable in
nature, simple converter topology, motor friendly waveforms with low dv/dt and inherent
four quadrants operation. Current Source Inverter fed ac drives are said to have their own
advantages and these advantages are the major factor behind their increasing usage. The
Current source inverter was invented before 1988 and however it was not widely used as
Voltage source inverters. But it has been observed from various research studies that CSI fed
PMSM drives are said to have wider scope of work in electronics. It has been observed that
before the year 2000 most of the work was performed without CSI fed drives and it was not
widely used in many applications(Kapadia and Chandwani, 2012). Earlier version of inverter
had the capacity to drive only one induction motor and in order to overcome this shortage
CSI fed drives was explored to handle system. The features of CSI fed drives are strong
commutation capability, inbuilt potential to drive multi induction motors, easy overcurrent
protection and simple structure with only sis thyristors. The process of implementing
multilevel inverters enhances the rapid response and torque under different operating
conditions (Pandey and Dubey, 2013). PI controller is used as speed controller and PWM
technology is used to activate switches of multilevel inverter. There are two types of
permanent magnet synchronous motor (PMSM) available in the drives industry,one with a
sinusoidal flux distribution and otherwith trapezoidal flux distribution. PMSM is said to have
lot of advantages when compared with other machines that are conventionally applied for ac
servo drives. PMSM drives are increasingly used for high performance servo application like
aerospace actuators and robotics as there is no external excitation and rotor losses are reduced
and make PMSM highly systematic and efficient. PMSM are said to perform efficiently than
the IM because they operate under high power and also the absence of magnetizing current is
added advantage. CSI is an impressive solution for high power drivers. The conventional
gate turn-off thyristor (GTO) based CSI-fed ac machine drives suffer from drawbacks
such as low-frequency torque pulsation, harmonic heating, and unstable operation at
low-speed ranges. A current source inverter (CSI) requires a capacitor filter for the
commutation of switching device as well as for attenuating switching harmonics. CSI
has originally been adopted for relatively high-power applications, in which a source of
constant dc input current is readily available like in the medium voltage ac drives. The
inherent bidirectional operation, smoother set of output voltage, short circuit protection,
induced shaft voltage and excessive insulation stress are the major reason for applying CSI in
widely in most of the applications (Patel and Patel, 2013). CSI is not advantageous always
and it does has its own drawbacks like poor dynamic response and bulky over size at its dc
source end are the common disadvantages of CSI fed drives however, its disadvantages can
be easily overcome with its advantages based on the circumstances that it is been operated.
Dixit, et al (2012) reported that current source inverter is fed with adjustable current from a
dc current source. The waves of the output current are not affected by the load in CSI fed
drives. It has been observed that the amplitude of the output current is independent of the
load but magnitude of output voltage and its waveform output from current source inverter is
dependent on the nature of the load. The input of the dc in current source inverter is extracted
from a fixed voltage ac source through a controller rectifier bridge or a diode bridge and a
chopper. CSI fed drives has inherent protection against short circuits across its terminals and
are hence not adaptable for multi motor drives. According to Yazhini, et al (2014) multilevel
inverters are said to be more important in the field of high power medium-voltage control.
The advantages of multilevel inverters are they are capable to operate with low switching
frequency, reduced voltage stress, very low harmonic distortion and reduced switching loss,
electromagnetic interference and conduction loss. Permanent Magnet Synchronous Motor
(PMSM) is widely used for exact speed, torque control, better efficiency and higher torque to
inertia ratio and high power density. The implementation of PMSM with the voltage
source inverter means for the conversion of electric energy from DC to AC. The main
performance of the inverter is influenced by the PWM technique, the switching losses
and conduction losses. PMSM has various advantages over other machines that are
conventionally used for ac servo drives. Permanent Magnet Synchronous Machine (PMSM)
are highly used in large frequency in wide variety of industrial applications because of their
efficiency and high power density, high reliability and torque to inertia ratio (Megavath and
Laxminarayana, 2014). PMSM is said to address the requirements like fast dynamic response
and high power in high power applications. The continuous cost reduction of magnetic
material in recent days, with high energy density and coercitivity makes the ac drives based
on PMSM more competitive and attractive and it has been the eye opener for gaining new
opportunities for large scale applications. It is been expected that the future will witness the
highest usage of PMSM drives and the advantages associated with PMSM drives have highly
attracted the industrialist. The PMSM drive systems for such applications normally
require high starting torque and wide speed range as well as high efficiency and power
density. The terms current-fed and voltage-fed are utilized in relationship with output from
the inverter circuits. A VSI (Voltage Source Inverter) is the DC input voltage is basically
constant and self-sufficient of load current drawn. Inverter indicates the load voltage whereas
the peaked current shape is stated by load. The input of DC power to inverter is attained from
rotating alternator or existing network of power supply via rectifier or fuel, cell, battery,
photo voltage array or generator of MHD (Magneto Hydro Dynamic). The inverters are
broadly classified as current source inverters and voltage source inverters (Reddy, Babu and
Rao, 2010). A VSI is the DC source has negligible or small impedance. Or else, VSI contain
stiff DC voltage source in its terminals. Due to the low internal impedance, VSIs terminal
voltage remains constant substantially with variations in the load. Alternatively, current
source inverter is supplied with control current from DC source of high impedance. Vazquez,
et al. (2010) revealed that, usually, dc or ac converters may be classified into two types: CSIs
and VSIs; however, the impedance source inverter known as ZSI (“z” source inverter) was
proposed. These inverters were proposed as the adjustable motor drives. Hence, this type of
converter may be broadly classified into full-bridge inverters, multilevel inverters (MI) and
half-bridge inverters, and the last may be sub-divided into flying capacitor inverters, NPC
(neutral point clamped inverters), cascade full-bridge inverters and currently, hexagram and
hybrid inverters. In Masiboina’s (2014) point of view, the general inherent photovoltaic
systems’ drawback is the intermittent natures which make them defective. However, by
merging these two intermittent sources & by incorporating the algorithms of MPPT
(maximum power point tracking), the transfer of power systems’ reliability and efficiency
may be developed significantly. The single-rating inductor of multilevel current source
inverter is used to feed a load of three-phase system. The converter comprises of numerous
identical modules that find out the various current levels. The module in each phase utilizes
six power switches and two balance inductors. The converter’s behavior is very distinct from
the traditional behavior of MVSI. In this, each module contains a fraction of load current,
also there is no switches per phase or no partition of modules as happen in multilevel voltage
source inverter. In MVSI, when low voltage is given to load, the outmost switches stop
functioning, and finally load current is passed by the switches that joined close to the
converters’ central point. Multilevel z-source inverters are considered to be a pioneering sort
of power converter selection for the medium voltage applications. The multilevel inverter
field was the most dynamic spot in the analysis and growth of power electronics in last
decades. Several engineering process blown up their requirements of power level, converters,
manufacture of novel power semi-conductor devices and control policies to reduce the
production cost. Currently, the multilevel inverters revolution has numerous gorgeous
features (Yousuf and Latha, 2014). Especially, THD, voltage stress, lesser switching losses,
EMI, output voltage step, higher quality of power and efficiency are the features in multilevel
inverters. In addition, the multilevel inverter expands its benefit to the system of renewable
energy such as PV cells, fuel cells and wind for the high power applications. Multilevel
inverter plays a very important role in the high-power and medium-voltage control. The
required multi-staircase voltage output is attained by merging several direct current voltage
sources. Presently, there exist three profitable topologies of the MVSI are as follows: Flying
capacitor (FC), Neutral point clamped (NPC) and Cascaded H-bridge (CHB). The voltage
level is augmented by increasing the count of switches, for these topologies. Hence there
might be voltage stresses, switching losses and the circuit will turn out to be more difficult, in
these topologies. PMSM (Permanent Magnet Synchronous Motor) is broadly used for torque
control, exact speed, better efficiency, and then high power density and higher torque to
inertia ratio (Yazhin, Sathik and Ramani, 2014). The PMSM implementation with VSI is
used for the alteration of electrical energy from Direct Current to Alternating Current. Few
topologies in MCSIs were proposed by engineers and researchers. A conventional method to
create multilevel current waveform is done by paralleling several three levels H-bridge
current source inverters. This topology is one of the dual circuits of the cascade multilevel
voltage source inverter. Though, the constraint of many isolated direct-current sources with
their bulky, complex and costly isolation inductors and transformers is a major issue
introduced by this topology. One more topology of MCSI is attained by implying a multi
rating inductor multilevel CSI or multi cell topology of the CSI that is the dual converter of
flying capacitor based full bridge multilevel voltage source inverter. This topology contain
drawback with the bulky intermediary inductors and difficulty for balancing control of
intermediate level currents point out Haribasker, et al. (2015).Navyasri and Thakur (2015)
clearly exposed that the solar photovoltaic (PV) systems utilize the PV modules to change the
sunlight energy into electrical energy. Photovoltaic pumping systems are getting more
concentration in current years particularly in the remote areas in which association to the grid
is theoretically costly or not possible. Direct current motor driven the PV pumps and that are
used throughout the world. Because, they may be directly linked to an adjustable DC drive
and PV generator is easy to attain. PV pumping system depends on induction motor (IM)
provides the alternative motor for maintenance free and more reliable systems. The main
benefits of Induction Motors are ruggedness, reduced unit cost, and construction of brushless
rotor & ease of maintenance. PMSM is also known as brushless DC motor, which joined to
the centrifugal pump, is identified to be appropriate for the system of PV water pumping.
Hence, PMSM become a critical contestant of IMs in the applications of hybrid electric
vehicle. Multilevel inverters have attained rising acceptance in the applications of high
performance and high power. Currently, multilevel inverters are broadly used as static-var
compensators, motor drive and active power filters applications. The benefits of MLI are low
switching loss, good power quality and capability of high voltage. The CHB MLI (cascaded
H-bridge multilevel inverter) is broadly used because of simplicity and modularity of the
control (Thakre and Mohanty, 2015). A Pulse Width Modulation technique, Carrier-based
PWM utilizes numerous triangular carrier signals that may be altered in phase or vertical
position to decrease the output voltage-harmonic content. New modulation technique known
as TTMC (trapezoidal triangular multi carrier) SPWM is implemented & compared with the
other techniques. This new modulation technique provides benefits in MLI to reduce the
percentage of THD (total harmonic distortion) and also to raise the output voltage. According
to Narkhede, Mahajan and Ansari (2016), there are two kinds of grid associated PV systems
that present with centralized linked configuration and string connected configuration,
generally. The centralized linked configuration presents in sequence & parallel linked PV
modules to increase the power levels. The CSI topology are favored for interfacing
photovoltaic system to AC load for following reason, they are as follows: It give smooth
direct current. The energy storage element of CSI has longer lifetime than when compared to
VSI. CSI has the boosting capability of inherent voltage that permits integration of the PV
panels of the lower output voltages.

Vector control is generally utilized in ac devices in order to convert them, with respect ot the
performance, into corresponding independently excited dc devices that have greatly enviable
control traits. Multilevel inverter technology has appeared in recent times as a very essential
substitute in the field of high-power-medium voltage energy control. Benefits of multilevel
inverters over traditional two-level inverter are decreased harmonics, less switching failures.
The unique structure of multilevel voltage source inverters enables them to attain high
voltage and power phases devoid of the utilization of the transformers. There are three kinds
of multilevel topologies, cascaded multilevel inverters, diode clamped and flying capacitor
multilevel inverter. Diode clamped multilevel inverter is selected for feeding PMSM drive on
the whole formations of multilevel inverter (Pandey and Dubey, 2013).

1.2 Problem statement

This research focuses in combining the benefits of both multilevel topology and that of
Current Source Inverter fed drives. The voltage source inverter (VSI) fed drives are largely
used in low and medium power applications, but not utilized largely in high power
applications. At present, current source inverter (CSI) fed motor drives are raisingly utilized
fro medium-voltage high-power applications where rapid reaction is not required due to the
following advantages: simple converter topology, innate four quadrant operation,
accessibility and motor friendly waveforms with low dv/dt. Power electronics has quickly
changed in the past thirty years and the number of applications has been raising,
predominantly because of the improvements of the microprocessor technology and
semiconductor devices (Srivastava and Tripathi, 2011). To suppress the innate instability of
current dfed induction motor, a coefficient of derivative of actual motor’s currents is included
to the reference ones. There are two kinds of permanent-magnet ac motor drives are
obtainable in the drives industry. these are PMSM drive with a sinusoidal flux allocation.
PMSM has various benefits over othe devices and machines, which are traditionally utilized
for ac servo drives. The utilization of the permanent magnet in the rotor of the PMSM
generates it essential to provide magnetizing current all the way through the stator for
continuous air gap flux; the stator current require only be troque-generating. Therefore, for
the same output, the PMSM would function at a higher power factor, due to the lack of
magnetizing current and would be more effective than the IM. PMSM drives are largely
utilized for high-performance servo applications such as aerospace and robotics actuators as
no external excitation is provided to rotor losses are decreased and generate PMSM greatly
effective and efficient. PMSM drives are desired due to less difficulty in control as compared
with field related control of induction motor drives (Pandey and Dubey, 2013).

1.3 Aim and Objectives

1.3.1 Aim of the study

The main intention of the study is to investigate in detail about design and implementation of
multilevel current source inverter fed PMSM drive.

1.3.2 Objectives of the study

i. To identify different Multilevel Current Source Inverters (power circuits) and Current
Source Inverter fed Drives and their inherent advantages
ii. To compare different modulation control techniques for PMSM for drive application
iii. To design and develop the power circuit for the MCSI fed PMSM drive
iv. To employ an appropriate sensored feedback control
v. To implement proposed MCSI fed PMSM drive using TMS320F28335
vi. To test hardware circuit and compare the simulated results

1.4 Research Questions

1. What are the different Multilevel Current Source Inverters (power circuits) and
Current Source Inverter fed Drives and their inherent advantages?
2. How to compare different modulation control techniques for PMSM for drive
application?
3. How to design and develop the power circuit for the MCSI fed PMSM drive?
4. How to employ an appropriate sensored feedback control?
5. How to implement proposed MCSI fed PMSM drive using TMS320F28335?
6. How to test hardware circuit and compare the simulated results?

1.5 Limitations of the research

a) The findings of the research are restricted to multilevel current source inverter alone
b) This study is limited to PMSM drive alone
c) This study focuses mainly on design and implementation of multilevel current source
inverter fed PMSM drive

1.6 Structure of the thesis

The proceeding chapters of this research are structured as follows:

Chapter 1 provides an outline and the background of the research concept. It also initiates
the current significance and scope of the work to be carried out in the thesis.
Chapter 2 provides comparative study of non-conventional and conventional recent source
fed multilevel inverters. This kind of comparative study narrows down on a specific kind of
power circuit topology that is then utilized for the drive simulations.

Chapter 3 initiates the Permanent Magnet Synchronous Motor. The different control
methods and techniques, which could be executed for PMSM drive are discussed in this
chapter. The most important method or technique is zeroed down on that is then utilized for
the PMSM drive simulations.

Chapter 4 provides PSIM/MATLAB-SIMULINK simulations are carried out for various CSI
fed multilevel inverters in order to finalize the topology of this research. Governing principles
is of total harmonic deformation, number of power devices and number of inductors.

Chapter 5 describes MATLAB/PSIM simulations done for the real system ie. Multilevel
Current Source Inverter fed PMSM drive, a control method or technique is finalized for the
real system execution, entire harmonic distortion, present waveform-levels and speed rise
time (response time) are utilized for convergence.

Chapter 6 integrates comparison of processor or controller to be utilized for controlling

switching pattern of power circuit.

Chapter 7 includes designing for power circuit, feedback circuit of multilevel present source
inverter (for five level output) drive is explained. Design is carried out considering a specific
PMSM and its ratings of power.

Chapter 8 provides the results acquired from hardware execution or implementation of

proposed scheme are compared with simulation results.

Chapter 9 includes conclusion and possible expansion with respect to output power and load
applied to the motor and various rating PMSM are discussed.

Apart from these, this thesis also entails bibliography which explains the list of references
used in each chapter and is pursued by presentations and publications carried out based on the
work.
References:

1) Srivastava, A. K., & Tripathi, S. M. (2011). Current Source Inverter fed Induction
Motor Drives: A Survey. International Journal of Electrical Systems (IJES), 1(1), 14-
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Synchronous Motor Drive with Constant Torque Angle Control, Advance in
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