A Novel Three-phase Three-leg AC/AC Converter Using Nine IGBTs

C.Liu , B.Wu, N.Zargari* and D.Xu Dept. of Electrical & Computer Engineering *MV Drive R&D Ryerson University Rockwell Automation Canada Toronto, Ontario, Canada Cambridge, Ontario, Canada
Abstract This paper proposes a novel three-phase nine-switch AC/AC converter topology. This converter features sinusoidal inputs and outputs, unity input power factor, and more importantly, low manufacturing cost. The operating principle of the converter is elaborated, its modulation schemes are discussed, and experimental results from a 5kVA prototype system are provided. I. INTRODUCTION

Three-phase AC/DC/AC and AC/AC converter configurations with variable frequency and variable voltage operation have found wide applications in industry. The most popular configuration uses voltage source inverter (VSI) with a diode rectifier as a front end for adjustable speed drives (ASD), uninterrupted power supplies (UPS) and other industrial applications. This configuration features low cost and reliable operation due to the use of the diode rectifier, but the rectifier generates highly distorted line currents, and it does not have regenerative or dynamic braking capability. These problems can be mitigated by using a back-to-back converter topology shown in Fig. 1, where a PWM voltage source rectifier is used to replace the diode rectifier [1,2]. The back-to-back converter configuration requires 12 active switches such as IGBTs with increased manufacture cost. In addition, it needs a large size dc capacitor. To reduce the device count and minimize/eliminate the dc capacitor filter, various converter topologies have been proposed in the literature.

adjustable ac output voltage. It is capable of bi-directional energy transfer for the supply to the load or vice versa. There is no dc link circuit, and therefore the dc capacitor filter in the back-to-back converter is not required. However, the matrix converter normally requires 18 IGBT switches and its switching scheme is complex. The high cost and complex control have made this topology less attractive. To reduce the number of IGBTs, several Sparse Matrix Converters (SMC) have been proposed [4, 5]. One of them employs 15 switches with the cost still higher than that of the back-to-back converter. To reduce the manufacturing cost further, several modified converter topologies with reduced switch count have been proposed, such as five-leg converter topologies using 10 IGBTs [6] and VIENNA rectifiers [7]. In this paper, a novel one-stage three-phase AC/AC converter topology is proposed. Different from all other existing converter topologies, this converter has only three legs using only nine active switches for AC/AC conversion.
II. NINE-SWITCH CONVERTER TOPOLOGY

Fig. 2 shows the proposed three-phase nine-switch converter topology. This converter has three legs with three switches per leg. The novelty of this converter is that the middle switch in each of the three converter legs is shared by the rectifier and inverter, thereby reducing the switch count by 33% and 50% in comparison to the back-to-back converter and matrix converter, respectively. The input power is delivered to the output partially through the middle three switches and partially through a quasi dc link circuit. For the convenience of discussion, we can consider that the rectifier of the nine-switch converter is composed of top three and middle three switches whereas the inverter consists of middle three and bottom three switches. The converter has two modes of operation: 1) constant frequency (CF) mode, where the output frequency of the inverter is constant and also the same as that of the utility supply while the inverter output voltage is adjustable, and 2) variable frequency (VF) mode, where both magnitude and frequency of the inverter output voltage are adjustable. The CF mode of operation is particularly suitable for applications in uninterruptible power supplies whereas the VF mode can be applied to variable-speed drives.

Fig. 1 Conventional back-to-back converter topology. One of the promising converter topologies is the matrix converter [3]. This converter presents a radical change in topology and directly converts a fixed ac input voltage to an

1-4244-0655-2/07/$20.002007 IEEE

2685

vA

S1
Ls

that v mr is always higher than v mi . These two modulating waveforms are compared with a common triangular carrier vc . The generated rectifier and inverter leg voltages, v AN

and v XN , are also shown in the figure. This arrangement guarantees that switch state 4 in the back-to-back converter is eliminated here for the nine-switch converter.
S2

Cd

Vd

Table 1 Switching states and converter leg voltages (a) Back-to-back converter Switching State S1 On Off On Off S2 Off On Off On S3 On Off Off On S4 Off On On Off

RL

LL

v AN
Vd 0 Vd 0

v XN
Vd 0 0 Vd

S3

1 2 3 4

Fig. 2 The proposed nine-switch AC/AC converter with a quasi dc link.

III. MODULATION SCHEMES

A.

Switching Constraint

(b) Proposed nine-switch converter Switching State 1 2 3 S1 On Off On S2 On On Off S3 Off On On

The reduction of the number of switches in the proposed converter topology imposes certain switching constraints for the switching pattern design. In the back-to-back converter, the rectifier leg voltage v AN , which is the voltage at note A with respect to the negative dc bus N, can be controlled by switches S1 and S 2 in the rectifier, while the inverter leg voltage v XN can be controlled by S 3 and S 4 in the inverter shown in Fig. 1. This means that the rectifier and inverter leg voltages can be controlled independently. The back-to-back converter topology has four switching states per phase as defined in Table 1. For the nine-switch topology, we need to control the input and output voltages independently through three switches per leg, where the middle two switches are shared by the rectifier and inverter. The proposed converter has only three switching states per phase as illustrated in Table 1. It can be observed that switching state 4 for the back-to-back converter does not exist in the nine-switch converter, which implies that the inverter leg voltage vXN cannot be higher that the rectifier leg voltage vAN. This is, in fact, the main constraint for switching scheme design of the nine-switch converter. The principle of carrier based sinusoidal modulation schemes and space vector modulation (SVM) schemes can be applied to the nine-switching converter. When designing the switching pattern, the switching constraint discussed above must be satisfied. Fig. 3 illustrates the carrier based sinusoidal PWM scheme for the nine-switch converter. The rectifier modulating wave v mr and the inverter modulating wave v mi are arranged such

v AN
Vd 0 Vd

v XN
Vd 0 0

It should be pointed out that although v mr is always higher than vmi , this does not necessarily mean that the fundamental component of the inverter output voltage v XY should be lower than that of the rectifier input voltage v AB . In fact, the inverter output voltage can be higher than that of the rectifier input voltage due to the boost nature of the rectifier.

vmr
vmi vc
v AN
Vd

v XN

Vd

Fig. 3 PWM waveform generation, where switching state 4 of the back-to-back converter is eliminated.

2686

B. Modulation Scheme for CF Operation Mode Fig. 4 illustrates the modulation scheme for CF mode of operation, where mr and mi are the rectifier and inverter modulation indices for dc voltage and inverter output voltage adjustment, respectively. The gate signals are generated by comparing the rectifier and inverter sinusoidal modulating waveforms to a common triangular carrier wave.

of Ls = 2.5mH. The converter is loaded with a three phase RL load of RL = 8 and LL = 2.5mH. The dc capacitor C d is 2350 F. The rectifier is controlled by a vector control scheme with unity power factor operation. The inverter output voltage is not detected and therefore is not tightly controlled. The switching frequency of both rectifier and inverter is 3240Hz. Both CF and VF modes of operation are investigated. A. CF Operation Mode Fig. 6 shows the simulated waveform of the rectifier input voltage vAB and its harmonic spectrum with the converter operating in the CF mode. The modulation indices for the rectifier mr and inverter mi are both set at 0.9 and the dc voltage is maintained at 320V. The frequency of the dominant switching harmonics is centered around 3240Hz, which is the carrier frequency and also the switching frequency of the converter. The low order harmonics are negligibly small. Fig. 7 (a) shows the simulated waveform and spectrum of the inverter output voltage vXY with a fundamental frequency of 60Hz. It is interesting to note that the inverter output voltage waveform, its fundamental component, and THD are very close to those of the rectifier given in Fig. 6. Fig. 7(b) illustrates the THD curve of the inverter output voltage vXY versus the inverter modulation index mi of the nine-switch converter. The THD curve of the output voltage of the back-to-back converter operating at the same switching frequency is also plotted. It can be noted that the harmonic performance of the nine-switch converter is the same as that of its counterpart.

mi 1.0 mi 0.8 mi 0.6 mi 0.4 mi 0.2 mi 0

mr 0 mr 0.2 mr 0.4 mr 0.6 mr 0.8 mr 1.0

Fig. 4 Modulation scheme for CF mode of operation. C. Modulation Scheme for VF Operation Mode Fig. 5 shows the modulation scheme for the VF mode of operation. To satisfy the switching constraint discussed earlier, the maximum modulation indices, mr and mi , of the rectifier and inverter must be limited to 0.5. In this case, the dc voltage v d of the converter is twice of the rated dc voltage. However, with the constant frequency operation, the dc voltage of the converter can be tightly controlled and maintained at around its rated value.

mr 0.5 mr 0.35 mr 0.2

v AB (V )

mi 0.2 mi 0.35 mi 0.5

Fig. 5 Modulation scheme for VF mode of operation.

IV. SIMULATION ANALYSIS

The performance of the proposed nine-switch converter topology is simulated by simulink software. The utility supply is rated 208V and 60Hz with a supply inductance

Fig. 6 Rectifier input voltage waveform and its spectrum (CF operation mode).

2687

v XY (V )

v AB (V )

i A ( A)

v XY (V )

i A ( A)

Fig. 8 Simulated waveforms of the rectifier and inverter (CF operation mode).
mi

Fig. 7 Inverter output voltage waveform, spectrum and THD (CF operation mode).

A. Unity Power Factor Operation The input power factor of the converter can be leading, lagging or unity. Fig. 9 shows the measured supply phase voltage v A and line current i A of the converter with unity power factor operation. During the test, the dc voltage was maintained at 320V by the rectifier, and the converter modulation index was mr mi 0.9 . It should be pointed out that the control of the rectifier and inverter is decoupled, and therefore, the inverter operation will not affect the operation of the rectifier. B. CF Operation Mode Fig. 10 shows measured voltage and current waveforms when the inverter operates with the same frequency as that for the rectifier. The modulation index of the rectifier and inverter was 0.9 while the dc voltage of the converter was 320V. The harmonic spectrum of v AB and v XY matches very well with that obtained by the simulation in Figs. 6 and 7.

B. VF Operation Mode Fig. 8 shows the simulated rectifier input and inverter output waveforms when the converter operates in the VF mode. The rectifier operates at 60Hz while the inverter operates at 30Hz. The modulation index for the rectifier and inverter is 0.45. To avoid high dc voltage due to the low rectifier modulation index, the utility voltage is reduced by 50%. In this case the dc voltage of the converter is maintained at 320V, the same value as that in the CF operation mode. The figure illustrates that the rectifier and the inverter can operate independently with different fundamental frequencies.
V. EXPERIMENTAL VERIFICATION

A 5kVA prototype system was built and tested. The values of the supply voltage, source inductance Ls , dc capacitor C d and RL load parameters are the same as those given in the simulation.

2688

vA

C. VF Operation Mode

iA

Fig. 11 illustrates the converter input and output voltage waveforms and their harmonic spectrum at the input frequency of 60Hz and output frequency of 30Hz. The modulation index for the rectifier and inverter is 0.45. The supply voltage in this case is reduced to half of the rated voltage of 208V such that the dc voltage can remain at 320V. The spectrum shows that the frequency of the dominant harmonics is centered around 3240Hz while all the low order harmonics are eliminated. Fig. 12 shows the dynamic response of the converter input and output waveforms when the converter output frequency has a step increase from 30Hz to 120Hz. It demonstrates that control for the converter input and output variables are independent and decoupled, similar to that of the back-to-back converter.

Fig. 9 Unity input power operation of the rectifier.

vAB

vAB
vXY

vXY
vAB

vXY

vAB

iA

vXY

iX
Fig. 11 Measured waveforms and spectrum (VF operation mode).

Fig. 10 Measured rectifier and inverter waveforms (CF operation mode).

2689

vAB

[3] T. Podlesak, D.C. Katsis, et al, A 150-kVA VectorControlled Matrix Converter Induction Motor Drive, IEEE Trans. on Industry Applications, Vol. 41, Issue 3, pp841-847, 2005. [4] Kolar, J.W. Baumann, et al, Novel Three-phase AC-DCAC Sparse Matrix Converter", IEEE Applied Power Electronics Conference (APEC), pp777-791, 2002. [5] M. Jussila, M. Eskola and H. Tuusa, Analysis of NonIdealities in Direct and Indirect Matrix Converters, The European Conference on Power Electronics and Applications, 10 pages, 2005. [6] C. Jacobina, I.S. De Freitas, et al, Reduced Switch Count DC-Link ACAC Five-Leg Converter, IEEE Trans. on Power Electronics, Vol. 21, No. 5, pp13011310, 2006. [7] J. Minibck and J.W. Kolar, Novel Concept for Mains Voltage Proportional Input Current Shaping of a VIENNA Rectifier Eliminating Controller Multipliers, IEEE Trans. on Industrial Electronics, Vol. 52, No. 1, pp162-170, 2005.

vXY

iA

iX

Fig. 12 Measured waveforms when the inverter output frequency has a step increase from 30Hz to 120Hz while the rectifier input frequency remains at 60Hz.

VI. CONCLUSIONS

A novel nine-switch PWM AC/AC converter topology is proposed in the paper. The topology uses only nine IGBT devices for AC to AC conversion through a quasi dc link circuit. Compared with the conventional back-to-back PWM converter using 12 IGBT switches and matrix converter using 18 switches, the number of switches in the proposed converter is reduced by 33% and 50%, respectively. The proposed converter features sinusoidal inputs and outputs, unity input power factor, and low manufacturing cost. The operating principle of the converter is elaborated, and modulation schemes for constant and variable frequency operations are developed. Experimental verification is carried out on 5kVA prototype system.
REFERENCES

[1] D. Casadei, G. Grandi, et al, Comparison Between Back-to-back and Matrix Converters Based on Thermal Stress of the Switches, IEEE International Symposium on Industrial Electronics, Vol. 2, pp1081-1086, 2004. [2] B. Wu, High-Power Converters and AC Drives, Wiley IEEE Press, ISBN: 0-4717-3171-4, 2006.

2690