Electric Power Systems Research 81 (2011) 11321143

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Electric Power Systems Research

journal homepage: www.elsevier.com/locate/epsr

A four-leg unied seriesparallel active lter system for periodic

and non-periodic disturbance compensation
Mehmet Ucar, Sule Ozdemir, Engin Ozdemir
Department of Electrical Education, Technical Education Faculty, Kocaeli University, Umuttepe Kampus, Izmit 41380, Kocaeli, Turkey

a r t i c l e i n f o a b s t r a c t

Article history: This paper presents a three-phase four-leg (3P4L) unied seriesparallel active lter (USPAF) system,
Received 10 August 2010 compensating for both periodic and non-periodic disturbances using a generalized non-active power
Received in revised form 3 December 2010 theory (GNAP) based control strategy. The 3P4L USPAF system is realized by the integration of series and
Accepted 4 January 2011
parallel active lters (AFs), composed of the two 3P4L voltage source inverters (VSIs) sharing a common
Available online 22 January 2011
dc-link capacitor. The GNAP theory was implemented previously in the parallel AF. In this study, the
theory is proposed for the 3P4L USPAF system to compensate non-sinusoidal periodic and non-periodic
Keywords:
currents and voltages. Distorted source voltages and unbalanced non-linear load currents compensation
Active lter
Four-leg voltage source inverter
were veried simultaneously through the 3P4L USPAF system experimental prototype. Sub-harmonic
Harmonics and stochastic non-periodic current/voltage compensations were analyzed through simulations with
Non-periodic Matlab/Simulink software. The simulation and experimental results showed that the theory proposed
Sub-harmonic for the 3P4L USPAF system was applicable to non-active power compensation in three-phase four-wire
Unbalance (3P4W) systems under periodic and non-periodic disturbances.
2011 Elsevier B.V. All rights reserved.

1. Introduction Unied seriesparallel active lter (USPAF) systems have been

In recent years, the increasing use of power electronic devices
and unbalanced/non-linear loads has led to the generation of non-
sinusoidal periodic and non-periodic current/voltage disturbances
in electrical power systems. Generally, power electronic converters
generate harmonic components with frequencies that are integer
multiplies of the line frequency. However, in some cases, such as
line commutated three-phase thyristor based rectiers, arc fur-
naces and welding machines are typical loads, the line currents
may contain both frequency lower than the line frequency (sub-
harmonic) and frequency higher than the line frequency (stochastic
non-periodic, the wave-shape and amplitude are constantly chang-
ing) components but not integer multiple of the line frequency
[15]. These waveforms are considered as non-periodic, although
mathematically the currents may still have a periodic waveform,
but in any event, the period of the currents is not equal to the period
of the line voltage [1,2]. The non-periodic components can occur as
well in the source voltage. The effects of non-periodic components
of current and voltage are similar to that caused by harmonics.
They may contribute power loss, disturbances, measurement errors
and control malfunctions, thus degradation of the power quality in
distribution systems [2].
Corresponding author. Tel.: +90 262 3032248; fax: +90 262 3032203.
E-mail addresses: eozdemir@kocaeli.edu.tr, eozdemir@hotmail.com
(E. Ozdemir).
widely studied to compensate the disturbances of source voltage
and load current simultaneously. The USPAF system consists of a
series active lter (AF) and a parallel AF combined with a com-
mon dc-link. The parallel AF compensates the current disturbances
and regulates the dc-link voltage, while the series AF compensates
the voltage disturbances [69]. Fig. 1 shows the general power cir-
cuit conguration of the USPAF system. The USPAF structures are
used in the literature such as two three-phase three-leg (3P3L)
voltage source inverter (VSI) with split capacitor [7,1014], a 3P3L
VSI for the series AF and a three-phase four-leg (3P4L) VSI for
the parallel AF [15,16] and two 3P4L VSI topology [17] for solv-
ing power quality disturbances at the point of common coupling
(PCC).
The conventional 3P3L VSI with split capacitor topology has a
neutral line directly connected to the midpoint of the dc-link. This
topology has been widely used in the USPAF systems due to its
simplicity to compensate the zero-sequence components in the
three-phase four-wire (3P4W) power system. However, this topol-
ogy needs two capacitors and an extra control loop to maintain a
zero voltage error difference between both the capacitor voltages,
resulting in a more complex control loop to maintain the dc-link
voltage at constant level [16]. In addition, it has poor dc-link volt-
age utilization performance and requires the dc-link voltage to be
maintained to be at least twice as large as the peak value of the
inverter nominal output voltage [17]. Furthermore, due to the rip-
ple voltage of the dc-link caused by harmonic power resulting from
the negative and zero-sequence currents, the capacitance of the dc-

0378-7796/$ see front matter 2011 Elsevier B.V. All rights reserved.
doi:10.1016/j.epsr.2011.01.001
 M. Ucar et al. / Electric Power Systems Research 81 (2011) 11321143 1133

Other vector i(t) in an m-phase system,

non-linear loads LL
v(t) = [v1 (t), v2 (t), . . . , vm (t)]T , (1)
LS vS + vSF vL T
3 i(t) = [i1 (t), i2 (t), . . . , im (t)] . (2)
iS N1/N2 iPF i L LL
Source RSF CSF CPF RPF The instantaneous power p(t) and the average power P(t), is
PCC Non-linear loads dened as the average value of the instantaneous power p(t) over
LSF LPF Sensitive the averaging interval [t Tc , t], that are:
loads
Cdc 
m
p(t) = vT (t)i(t) = vk (t)ik (t), (3)
Vdc USPAF system
k=1
Series AF Parallel AF  t
1
P(t) = p()d. (4)
Fig. 1. General power circuit conguration of the USPAF system. Tc tTc

In Eq. (4), the averaging time interval Tc can be chosen manu-

ally for different cases such as a periodic system with harmonics, a
link should be large enough to satisfy the permitted ripple current periodic system with sub-harmonics, and a non-periodic system. A
specication of the dc-link capacitor [18]. specic value of Tc can be chosen to t the application or to achieve
In this paper, two 3P4L VSI based USPAF system is proposed. an optimal result for each case. The instantaneous active current
The 3P4L VSI topology uses an additional leg to control the zero- ia (t) and the instantaneous non-active current in (t) are given in
sequence component compared to the conventional 3P3L VSI with Eqs. (5) and (6) respectively.
split capacitor topology. The zero-sequence component is circu-
lated in the system via the fourth leg, the dc-link voltage oscillations P(t)
ia (t) = vp (t) (5)
can be made small [18]. Therefore, smaller dc-link capacitor than Vp2 (t)
those of the conventional topology is required and the dc-link in (t) = i(t) ia (t) (6)
capacitor voltage balancing algorithm is not necessary. The dc-link
voltage utilization performance of the 3P4L topology is better and In Eq. (5), voltage vp (t) is the reference voltage which is chosen
to obtain a specic output voltage, a lower dc-link voltage than on the basis of the characteristics of the system and the desired
the conventional topology sufces [17,19]. This also provides an compensation results. Vp (t) is the corresponding rms value of the
advantage for combined operation of the proposed 3P4L USPAF sys- reference voltage vp (t), that is:
tem and distributed generation system such as photovoltaic arrays   t
and wind turbines, which is connected to the dc-link, due to com- 1
Vp (t) = vTp ()vp ()d. (7)
pensate voltage interruption, as well as voltage sag, voltage swell, Tc tTc
harmonics and reactive power.
In the previous studies, the control algorithms for current and The instantaneous active power pa (t) and the instantaneous
voltage compensators were often based on the assumption that the non-active power pn (t) are dened by following equations,
load currents and the source voltages were periodic. The USPAF

m
systems have been applied to the compensation of voltage uctua- pa (t) = vT (t)ia (t) = vk (t)iak (t), (8)
tions related non-periodic waveform in recent years [6,10,2022].
k=1
Different non-active power theories in the time domain have been
discussed in [23]. The generalized non-active power (GNAP) theory 
m

was applied for the compensation of the periodic and non-periodic pn (t) = vT (t)in (t) = vk (t)ink (t). (9)
load current with the parallel AF [2426], the static synchronous k=1
compensator (STATCOM) [27] and voltage and current unbalance The average active power Pa (t) and average non-active power
compensation using an active lter [28]. The theory does not specify Pn (t) are dened by averaging the instantaneous powers over time
the characteristics of the voltage and current, they can theoretically interval [t Tc , t], that are:
be any waveshape. The main objective of this paper is to compen-  t
sate the non-sinusoidal periodic and non-periodic current/voltage 1
Pa (t) = pa ()d, (10)
disturbances using the 3P4L USPAF system based on the GNAP the- Tc tTc
ory. The simulation and experimental results show that the 3P4L  t
USPAF system using the proposed theory can regulate the load 1
Pn (t) = pn ()d. (11)
voltage, compensating the source voltage harmonics and the non- Tc tTc
periodic voltage components while simultaneously eliminating the
load current harmonics, unbalance and non-periodic current com- The rms values of the system voltage, the active current ia (t),
ponents. the non-active current in (t) and the current i(t) are given in [25].
The apparent power S(t), the apparent active power Pp (t), and the
apparent non-active power Q(t) are also dened based on the rms
2. Generalized non-active power theory values of the voltage and currents. In the GNAP theory, the stan-
dard denitions for an ideal three-phase sinusoidal power system
The instantaneous non-active power theory was rst presented use the fundamental period T to dene the rms values, the average
by Fryze [29] for periodic (but non-sinusoidal) waveforms in the active power and the non-active power. The averaging interval Tc
time domain. The GNAP theory [25] implemented on the 3P4L does not change the compensation results as long as it is an integral
USPAF system is based on Fryzes idea of non-active power and multiple of T/2, where T is the fundamental period of the system,
an extension of the theory proposed in [30] for periodic and non- if there are only harmonics in the load current in the periodic
periodic waveforms in the time domain. In this paper, all vectors are disturbances conditions. The non-active current is completely com-
denoted by lower case bold letters. Voltage vector v(t) and current pensated and purely sinusoidal source current with unity power
1134 M. Ucar et al. / Electric Power Systems Research 81 (2011) 11321143

Table 1
Tc selections for different compensation objectives [25].

Compensation objective vp Tc Resulting active current ia (t)

Single-phase or polyphase reactive current v T/2 or T Unity power factor and sinusoidal for sinusoidal vS
Single-phase or polyphase reactive current and harmonic current vf T/2 or T Sinusoidal regardless of vS distortion
Instantaneous reactive power for polyphase system v Tc 0 Instantaneously unity power factor for polyphase system
Non-periodic disturbance current vf n(T/2) Reduced amplitude and near sine wave with unity power factor
Sub-harmonic current vf nT Pure sine wave or smoothed sine wave with unity power factor
Stochastic non-periodic current vf nT Smoothed sine wave with near power factor

factor is achieved. However, in other cases, if the disturbance is where the transformation matrix is shown in Eq. (13).
non-periodic such as a three-phase load with sub-harmonics, or a
non-periodic load, Tc has signicant inuence on the compensation   va
dq 2 sin(1 t) sin(1 t 120 ) sin(1 t + 120 )
results, and the power and energy storage rating of the compen- Tabc = vb
sators components [27]. The Tc selection procedure is explained in
3 cos(1 t) cos(1 t 120 ) cos(1 t + 120 )
vc
Sections 4.2 and 4.3 under these conditions.
The choice of the time averaging interval Tc is also signicant (13)
in the energy storage design consideration of the 3P4L USPAF sys-
tem. Choosing a longer Tc results in a smoother source current with By this transform, fundamental positive sequence component,
smaller amplitude; however, this requires that the compensator which is transformed into dc quantities in d and q axes, can be
current increase as well as the energy storage requirement of the extracted by Eq. (14) and then transformed back into the abc refer-
compensator. If Tc is large enough, increasing Tc further will not ence frame using Eq. (15).
typically improve the compensation results signicantly. Gener-  t
ally, there is no need to increase Tc to a larger value as the small 1
vd,q = vd,q dt (14)
decrease in total harmonic distortion (THD) is often not worth the Tc tTc
larger capital costs (higher ratings of the compensator components
abc abc dq 1
and therefore higher capital expenses) [25]. This depends on the vabc1+ = Tdq vd,q ; (Tdq = Tabc ) (15)
frequency of the non-periodic or periodic signal. Tc is identied
as an ofine process based on the specic application as given in As shown in Fig. 3, the v1+ (t) is divided by its amplitude Vdqm
Table 1. Also, vp (t) can be source voltage vS (t) itself or vf (t), which using Eq. (16) and the output signals of the positive-sequence
is the fundamental component of vS (t), as shown in Table 1. detector (ia1+ , ib1+ , ic1+ ), have unity amplitude and in phase with
the fundamental positive-sequence component of the source volt-
ages (vSa1+ , vSb1+ , vSc1+ ) are obtained. Also, effective value of this
3. Control of the 3P4L USPAF system reference current ip (t) is given in Eq. (17).

The proposed 3P4L USPAF system is realized with two four-leg Vdqm = v2d + v2q (16)
VSIs with a dc-link capacitor and the GNAP theory based voltage and
 
current control strategies. This theory, used at rst for the parallel t
1
AF, is now proposed for the 3P4L USPAF system. Ip (t) = iTp ()ip ()d (17)
Tc tTc

3.1. Series AF control strategy
The series AF, which uses 3P4L VSI, control block diagram is
shown in Fig. 2. In this control strategy, the positive sequence
detector generates auxiliary control signals (ia1+ , ib1+ , ic1+ ) used as
a reference current ip (t) for the GNAP theory.
Block diagram of the positive sequence detector is shown in
Fig. 3. The fundamental frequency 1 (250) is used in a sine
wave generator to produce sin(1 t) and cos(1 t) signals at unity
magnitude. The source voltages (vSa , vSb , vSc ) are input of the
positive-sequence detector. These voltages are transformed into
the synchronous dq reference frame by using Eq. (12) with the
reference frame rotating at the fundamental frequency 1 .
The average power is calculated given Eq. (4) by using the refer-
ence currents and the source voltages. The sinusoidal load voltage
va (t) is derived by using Eq. (18) [31]. Fig. 4 shows block dia-
gram of the sinusoidal load voltage calculation which is applied
to the series AF control. As clearly shown in Fig. 2, the va (t) is
divided by its amplitude Vam using Eq. (19) and multiplied the
desired load voltage magnitude VLm* for converting the va (t) to
the desired load voltage vS1+ . Then, the compensation reference
voltages (vSFa , vSFb ,vSFc ) of the series AF are derived by Eq. (20).
P(t)
va (t) = ip (t) (18)
Ip2 (t)

dq
vSdq = Tabc vSabc , (12) Vdqm (16)
i1+
vd
vd (14)
vS dq
Tabc abc
Tdq v1+
vS X
Sinusoidal V *
Lm X Carrier-based
(13) vq (15)
load va vS1+ + v*SF PWM QSF vq (14)
Vam voltage
voltage
Positive (19) controller
sequence i1+
calculation 2
(18) (Fig. 4) X (Fig. 5)
detector Sine generator
(Fig. 3) 1
vSF [sin(1t) cos(1t)]

Fig. 2. The series AF control block diagram. Fig. 3. Block diagram of the positive sequence detector.
 M. Ucar et al. / Electric Power Systems Research 81 (2011) 11321143 1135

vS
iL
1/s 1/Tc P X Sinusoidal
+
source ia
+ in i*PF
current Hysteresis QPF
i1+ Tc delay ip va vS1+ calculation
+
i*PFn current
(5) ica controller
1 I p2 2
1/s +
1/Tc X iPF iPFn

1/Vm
vdc X
Tc delay PI

+
Fig. 4. Block diagram of the sinusoidal load voltage calculation. Vdc* dc voltage
control

2 Fig. 6. The parallel AF control block diagram.
Vam = v2aa + v2ab + v2ac (19)
3
vSF (t) = vS (t) vS1+ (t) (20) The average power is calculated given Eq. (4) by using load
The obtained reference voltages compared with the series AF currents and fundamental positive sequence source voltages
voltages in a simple carrier-based PWM controller, shown in Fig. 5, (vSa1+ , vSb1+ , vSc1+ ) over the averaging interval [t Tc , t]. Desired
the voltage references (van , vbn , vcn ) are generated for the three sinusoidal source currents (iSa1+ , iSb1+ , iSc1+ ) are derived by using Eq.
phases, all with respect to n the center point of the fourth leg. (5) and similar block diagram as shown in Fig. 4. The instantaneous
In addition, voltage feed-forward (with a Kv gain) is added to the non-active current in (t) is calculated as in Eq. (6). An additional
controller for the purpose of good reference tracking. The fourth leg active current ica (t) also required to meet the losses in Eq. (25) is
reference voltage vno is dened by Eq. (21) to achieve the optimum drawn from the source by regulating the dc-link voltage vdc to the
reference voltage Vdc . The PI controller is used to regulate the dc-
switching sequence using an offset voltage concept [32]. Then, all
the inverter phase output terminal reference voltages (vao , vbo , vco ) link voltage vdc as shown in Fig. 6. The error between the actual dc
with respect to the virtual dc-link midpoint of the split capacitor voltage and its reference value is treated in the PI controller and the
(o point) are dened in Eq. (24). output is multiplied by a sinusoidal fundamental template of unity
v amplitude for each phase of the three phases. The compensation
, i , i ) of the parallel AF are obtained by

max , vmin > 0 reference currents (iPFa

2
PFb PFc
Eq. (26). The reference neutral current is obtained in terms of phase
vmin currents with Eq. (27). The reference currents are compared the par-
vno = ,max v <0 (21)

2 allel AF currents and applied to hysteresis current controller. Thus,


vmax + vmin , otherwise the parallel AF switching signals QPF are obtained.
2   t 
vS1+
where vmin and vmax are dened as following, ica (t) = KP (Vdc vdc ) + KI (Vdc vdc ) dt (25)
Vm 0
vmin = min(van , vbn , vcn ), (22)
iPF (t) = in (t) ica (t) (26)
vmax = max (van , vbn , vcn ). (23)

iPFn = (iPFa + iPFb + iPFc ) (27)
vxo = vxn + vno , (24)

where x = a, b, c. Finally, the series AF switching signals QSF are gen-

erated by comparing the modulation signals with triangular carrier 4. Simulation and experimental results
wave.
The proposed 3P4L USPAF system prototype is designed and
3.2. Parallel AF control strategy developed in laboratory to validate the GNAP theory. A three-phase
delta-star (-Y) step-down transformer rated at 380/110 V and
The parallel AF, which uses 3P4L VSI, control block diagram is 25 kVA is used to provide a 3P4W experimental system voltages. In
shown in Fig. 6. this system, the line-to-neutral voltage is 110 V and the frequency

Fig. 5. Carrier-based PWM scheme for the series AF.

1136 M. Ucar et al. / Electric Power Systems Research 81 (2011) 11321143

Fig. 7. Power circuit block diagram of the 3P4L USPAF system implementation.

is 50 Hz. The power circuit and control block diagram of the 3P4L
USPAF implementation is given in Figs. 7 and 8, respectively.
In Fig. 7, the non-linear load-1 (RL loaded three-phase half
controlled thyristor rectier with ring angle 30 , RC loaded three-
phase diode rectier and RC loaded single-phase diode rectier) is
the load group that requires ideal source voltages. Also, the non-
linear load-2 (RC loaded three-phase diode rectier) is connected to
the PCC to create source voltage distortion, and resembles the effect
of other loads on a radial network. The three-phase source voltages
with distortion are synthesized by increasing system impedance
from 59 H to 4 mH and connecting the non-linear load-2 to PCC
as clearly shown in Fig. 7.
The 3P4L USPAF system has 3P4W power circuit conguration
based on the two four-leg VSI with a dc-link capacitor. The dc-link
voltage is adjusted at 350 V via parallel AF. The parallel AF is con-
nected in parallel with the load while the series AF is connected
in series with the utility and the load through three single-phase
series injection transformers. Both AFs are digitally controlled using
a dSPACE DS1103 controller board. The dSPACE controller board
includes a real-time processor and the necessary I/O interfaces
to carry-out the control operation. This hardware supports the
real time interface (RTI) tool that allows programming via Mat-
lab/Simulink. In this way, all the control circuit components are
implemented graphically within the Simulink environment.
In the 3P4L USPAF system, the load currents and the paral-
lel AF currents are measured by utilizing TEG NA-50P hall-effect
current sensors, source voltages and the series AF voltages are mea-
sured by utilizing the TEG NV-25P hall-effect based isolated voltage
sensors and the dc-link voltage is measured by AD210 isolation
amplier for control and protection purposes. All the measured
signals are scaled in the signal conditioning board which provides
the measured signals at the required voltage level for the dSPACE
analog digital converter (ADC) unit. The parallel VSI uses the vari-
able frequency hysteresis current controller. The series VSI uses
the carrier-based PWM voltage controller. The proposed algorithm
for the USPAF system requires sampling time of 20 s to execute

Fig. 8. Control block diagram of the 3P4L USPAF system implementation.

 M. Ucar et al. / Electric Power Systems Research 81 (2011) 11321143 1137

the Matlab/Simulink generated C-codes in real-time. The generated The proposed 3P4L USPAF non-active power compensation sys-
switching signals are taken out of DS1103 with the help of digital tem is simulated, and an experimental setup is also built, so that
I/O channels. different cases can be studied in simulations or experiments. The
The two four-leg VSI of the 3P4L USPAF system consists of eight rst case for periodic current and voltage compensation (Section
SEMIKRON SKM75GB128D dual-pack IGBT modules which are 4.1) is tested in the experimental setup and the last two cases
driven by 6-channel CONCEPT 6SD106EI and 2-channel 2SD106AI for (Sections 4.2 and 4.3) are simulated in Matlab/Simulink soft-
gate drivers. The IGBT gate drivers have analog dead time gener- ware since they are difcult to be carried out in an experimental
ation facility and also monitors the collectoremitter voltage for setup. The IEEE519 standard limits of 5% on THD in voltage or cur-
short-circuit failure condition. The dc-link capacitance rating is pro- rent is set on the THD of source currents and load voltages after
portional to the maximum energy storage variation of the capacitor. compensation in this study.
The energy exchange is different for a given dc-link voltage vari-
ation in particular application [26]. Different capacitance values
4.1. Distorted source voltage and unbalanced non-linear load
are required to meet different compensation cases. Because the
current compensation
instantaneous non-active power is zero at all times under periodic
conditions, the current owing into or out of the dc-link capacitor
The harmonic currents will produce voltage distortion that
is zero. Therefore, a small capacitor can meet the requirement of
can affect other sensitive loads at PCC as they interact with the
this case. Under non-periodic conditions, the average power P(t) is
impedance of an electrical distribution system. For compensation
time varying. The net energy owing in the dc-link capacitor is no
of periodic current and voltage with fundamental period T, using
longer zero over one cycle. The capacitor must have sufcient stor-
a compensation period Tc that is a multiple of T/2 is enough for
age capacity under these conditions to be able to absorb the load
complete compensation [25]. The non-linear load-1, which requires
power uctuations. In the USPAF system design presented, the dc-
clean supply voltage, is connected 3P4W power system to cre-
link capacitor size needed is determined through Matlab/Simulink
ate current unbalance and harmonics, and also the non-linear
simulations. The electrolytic capacitor 2350 F (two 4700 F, 450 V
load-2 is connected to the PCC to create supply voltage distor-
capacitors connected in series) is connected dc-link of the 3P4L
tion as shown in Fig. 7. The three-phase distorted load voltages
USPAF system.
before compensation are demonstrated in Fig. 10(a). After com-
The parallel AF currents and the series AF voltages are also uti-
pensation choosing the period as Tc = T/2, the three-phase source
lized in the overcurrent and overvoltage protection board. If a fault
voltages with distortion is compensated to the sinusoidal wave-
occurs, all IGBT gate signals are set to zero level so that the two
forms shown in Fig. 10(b). The THD of the load voltages, which
VSIs are disabled. Owing to the switching of the parallel and series
averaged 9.0% before compensation, is about 2.7% after compen-
VSIs, the compensating currents and voltages have unwanted high-
sation, which is well within the limits specied by IEEE519. In
order harmonics. High-pass passive lters represented by RPF , CPF
Fig. 10(c) there are shown from top to bottom, phase-a source
for parallel AF and RSF , CSF for series AF in Fig. 7 are connected to
voltage, injected voltage, compensated load voltage and dc-link
prevent the ow of switching harmonics into the PCC. The cou-
voltage. By means of the parallel AF current compensation, the THD
pling inductances LPF and LSF are necessary to limit di/dt in the
values of the source voltages are decreased about from 9.0% to 7.3%.
VSIs. Also, pre-charge resistors are utilized at the ac side of the
After the series AF compensation, the load voltage THD values are
parallel AF to limit the inrush current during the startup and by-
decreased to about 2.7%. Also, the dc-link voltage has a desired
passed after the dc-link capacitors are charged to their steady-state
reference value. The three-phase unbalanced non-linear source
value.
currents and source neutral current before compensation are pre-
The experimental waveforms were recorded by Textronix
sented in Fig. 10(d). After compensation choosing the period as
DPO3054 digital oscilloscope and the harmonic analyses were done
Tc = T/2, it is evident that the three-phase source currents are nearly
by Fluke 434 power quality analyzer. Fig. 9 illustrates the pho-
sinusoidal with constant amplitude that is shown in Fig. 10(e).
tographs of the 3P4L USPAF system laboratory prototype. Table 2
Moreover, the neutral line current is almost eliminated. The THD
shows the circuit parameters used in the simulation and experi-
of the source currents, which was about 27.8% before compensa-
ment.
tion, is about 4.2% after compensation. Fig. 10(f) illustrates from
top to bottom phase-a load current, injected current, source cur-
Table 2 rent and dc-link voltage waveforms during a load change. It can
The 3P4L USPAF system parameters. be seen that phase-a load current increases by about 25% after the
Components Symbol Parameters load change and the parallel AF maintains the source current at
sinusoidal wave and the dc-link voltage at set reference value of
Power source
Voltage, frequency VSabc , fs 110 V, 50 Hz
350 V.
Impedance LS 59 H The harmonic spectra of the phase-b load voltage before
DC-link and after compensation are shown in Fig. 11(a) and (b) respec-
Capacitors Cdc 2350 F (2 4700 F tively. The harmonic spectra of the phase-b source current before
connected in series)
and after compensation are shown in Fig. 12(a) and (b) respec-
Reference voltage Vdc* 350 V
Parallel AF tively. The experimental compensation results are summarized in
Filter LPF , RPF , CPF 2.5 mH, 5 , 10 F Tables 3 and 4.
Switching frequency fSWp 10 kHz
Series AF
Filter LSF , RSF , CSF 0.7 mH, 5 , 80 F 4.2. Sub-harmonic current and voltage compensation
Switching frequency fSWs 10 kHz
Injection transformer N1 /N2 , S 2, 5.4 kVA Sub-harmonics (frequency less than the fundamental fre-
Non-linear load-1
Three-phase thyristor rectier LL , Ldc , Rdc 3 mH, 5.7 mH, 22 
quency) are caused by arc furnaces, cycloconverters, welders,
Three-phase diode rectier LL , Cdc , Rdc 3 mH, 100 F, 30  rectiers feeding uctuating or cyclic load, motors working with
Single-phase diode rectier LL , Cdc , Rdc 3 mH, 330 F, 45  cyclic load and wind generators [33]. Sub-harmonic current/voltage
Non-linear load-2 compensation using the GNAP theory, when the fundamental fre-
Three-phase diode rectier Cdc , Rdc 8800 F, 15 
quency is an odd multiple of the sub-harmonic frequency, the
1138 M. Ucar et al. / Electric Power Systems Research 81 (2011) 11321143

Fig. 9. Photographs of the 3P4L USPAF experimental test setup. (a) Top view of the experiment desk. (b) Bottom view of the experiment desk.

Table 4
Summary of load current compensation.

Source current (iS ) Before compensation After compensation

RMS (A)
Table 3 Phase-a 12.4 16.4
Summary of distorted source voltage compensation. Phase-b 16.1 16.4
Phase-c 12.1 16.3
Load voltage (vL ) Before compensation After compensation
Neutral 5.2 1.2
RMS (V) THD (%)
Phase-a 101.2 110.3 Phase-a 29.1 4.3
Phase-b 100.8 109.5 Phase-b 26.7 4.0
Phase-c 101.6 109.7 Phase-c 27.7 4.4
THD (%) Unbalance (%)
phase-a 9.6 2.8 Neg. seq. 9.5 0.6
phase-b 8.4 2.6 Zero seq. 9.8 0.3
phase-c 9.2 2.7 Power factor 0.94 0.99
 M. Ucar et al. / Electric Power Systems Research 81 (2011) 11321143 1139

Fig. 10. Experimental results of distorted source voltage and unbalanced nonlinear load current compensation. (a) Load voltages before compensation. (b) Load voltages
after compensation. (c) Source, series AF, load and dc-link voltage waveforms. (d) Source currents before compensation. (e) Source currents after compensation. (f) Load,
parallel AF, source currents and dc-link voltage waveforms.

minimum Tc for complete compensation is 1/2 of the common
period of both fs and fsub . When fs is an even multiple of fsub , the
minimum Tc for complete compensation is the common period of
both fs and fsub [26]. If Tc is chosen as an integral multiple of the peri-
ods of all the frequencies in p(t), the average value P(t) is a constant.
Therefore, ia (t) is purely sinusoidal and in phase with the funda-
mental component of v(t). If Tc is not chosen this way, there are
still sub-harmonic components in ia (t), the non-active component
is not completely eliminated.
In this study, source voltage and load current contain sub-
harmonic of 10 Hz frequency and 20% amplitude are given in Eqs.
(28) and (29) for phase-a. Fig. 13 shows the sub-harmonic cur-
rent and voltage compensation simulation results. Three-phase
sub-harmonic source voltage and three-phase sub-harmonic load

Fig. 11. Harmonic spectra of phase-b load voltage. (a) Before compensation. (b) After compensation.
1140 M. Ucar et al. / Electric Power Systems Research 81 (2011) 11321143

Fig. 12. Harmonic spectra of phase-b source current. (a) Before compensation. (b) After compensation.

Fig. 13. Simulation results of sub-harmonic voltage and current compensation. (a) Three-phase sub-harmonic source voltage waveforms. (b) Positive sequence detector output
waveforms. (c) Three-phase load voltages after compensation. (d) Three-phase sub-harmonic load current waveforms. (e) Three-phase source currents after compensation.
(f) DC-link voltage.
 M. Ucar et al. / Electric Power Systems Research 81 (2011) 11321143 1141

current waveforms are shown in Fig. 13(a) and (d), respectively.
vSa = (155 + 15.5 sin(210t))sin(250t)
iLa = (21 + 2.1 sin(210t))sin(250t)
The positive sequence detector output waveforms under this
test case are shown in Fig. 13(b). The 3P4L USPAF system com-
pensates the sub-harmonic component by choosing Tc = 2.5T. Thus,
the three-phase voltage at the load terminals and the three-
phase source current are almost sub-harmonic free and with
constant amplitude as presented in Fig. 13(c) and (e). Also, the
dc-link voltage which follows the reference value as shown in
Fig. 13(f).
4.3. Stochastic non-periodic current and voltage compensation
The arc furnaces may contain stochastic non-periodic cur-
rents (frequency higher than fundamental frequency but not an
integer multiple of it) because of their rapidly changing load
current characteristics [25,34]. Also, static frequency converters,
cycloconverters, sub-synchronous converter cascades, induction
machines and uctuating loads may cause the stochastic non-
periodic current/voltage waveform [34]. Theoretically, the period
T of a non-periodic load is innite [25]. The GNAP theory is valid
for voltage and current of any waveshape, and the non-active cur-
rent can only be completely eliminated when Tc = t and t (ia (t)
is the shape as and in phase with vp (t) so that unity power fac-
tor is achieved). However, this is not practical in a power system,
(28)
and Tc is chosen to have a nite value (110 times that of the
(29) fundamental period). Additionally, the non-active components in
these loads cannot be completely compensated by choosing Tc as
T/2 or T, or even several multiples of T. Choosing that period as
may result in an acceptable both source current and load volt-
age which are quite close to a sine wave. If Tc is large enough,
increasing Tc further will not typically improve the compensa-
tion results signicantly [26]. In this work, phase-a source voltage
and load current components are given in Eqs. (30) and (31)
[34].
vSa = 155 sin(250t) + 11.6 sin(2104t 120 )
+ 15.5 sin(2117t 120 )
+ 7.7 sin(2134t) + 7.7 sin(2147t)
+ 31 sin(2250t 120 ) (30)
iLa = 21 sin(250t) + 6.3 sin(2104t 120 )
+ 8.4 sin(2117t 120 )
+ 4.2 sin(2134t) + 4.2 sin(2147t)
+ 10.5 sin(2250t 120 ) (31)

Fig. 14. Simulation results of stochastic non-periodic voltage and current compensation. (a) Three-phase stochastic non-periodic source voltage waveforms. (b) Positive
sequence detector output waveforms. (c) Three-phase load voltages after compensation. (d) Three-phase stochastic non-periodic load current waveforms. (e) Three-phase
source currents after compensation. (f) Load neutral current waveform. (g) Source neutral current after compensation. (h) DC-link voltage.
1142 M. Ucar et al. / Electric Power Systems Research 81 (2011) 11321143

Fig. 14. (Continued ).

Fig. 14 shows the stochastic non-periodic voltage and cur- 5. Conclusion

rent compensation choosing the period as Tc = 5T. The three-phase
stochastic non-periodic source voltage, the three-phase stochastic
non-periodic load current and load neutral current waveforms are
shown in Fig. 14(a), (d) and (f), respectively.
The positive sequence detector output waveforms under this
test case are shown in Fig. 14(b). After compensation, load voltages
and source currents are balanced and almost sinusoidal with low
THD as clearly shown in Fig. 14(c) and (e). The source neutral cur-
rent have been reduced considerably as presented in Fig. 14(g). In
addition, the dc-link voltage is maintained at the reference value
350 V as shown in Fig. 14(h).
The increasing applications of non-linear and disturbing loads
connected to the electrical power system are responsible for the
presence of periodic and non-periodic disturbances on the line
currents and voltages. In this paper, the GNAP theory, which
is applicable to sinusoidal or non-sinusoidal, periodic or non-
periodic, balanced or unbalanced electrical systems, is presented
and applied to the 3P4L USPAF system. The theory is adapted for
different compensation objectives by changing the averaging inter-
val Tc and applied to the 3P4L USPAF experimental setup system
built and tested in the laboratory. The dSAPCE DS1103 controller
 M. Ucar et al. / Electric Power Systems Research 81 (2011) 11321143
was used to implement the proposed approach in real-time. The
distorted source voltage with unbalanced non-linear load current
compensation was tested in the experiments. The sub-harmonic
and the stochastic non-periodic current and voltage compensations
were simulated in Matlab/Simulink. Simulation and experimental
results verify the validity of the GNAP theory for the best compen-
sation performance of non-sinusoidal periodic and non-periodic
current/voltage disturbances with the 3P4L USPAF system.
Acknowledgement
This work is supported by TUBITAK Research Fund (no:
108E083).
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