A Neutral-Point Voltage Controller With Hybrid Parameters for NPC Three-Level Grid-Connected Inverters Under Unbalanced Grid Conditions

Abstract

To solve the neutral-point (NP) voltage unbalancing problem, a conventional proportional integral (PI) controller is used for NP clamped (NPC) three-level grid-connected inverters under balanced grid conditions. However, when the three-phase grid voltage is unbalanced, the NP voltage unbalancing problem becomes more serious and complex, which cannot be solved by a conventional PI controller with the variation of the unbalanced grid. Based on the transfer function of the injected zero-sequence component to the NP voltage, the NP voltage module has different characteristic performances in frequency-domain, which is a leading or lagging system with the variation of the unbalanced grid and output power factor. Besides, being appropriate for this NP voltage module in two cases, a PI controller with hybrid parameters (HP-PI controller) is proposed to balance the NP voltage in this paper. According to varied unbalanced grid and output power factor, hybrid parameters are designed for this controller in two cases by the Lagrange multiplier method appropriately. Furthermore, frequency-domain characteristics and the balancing time of the proposed HP-PI control method are analyzed. Experimental and simulation results show that, compared with conventional PI and quasi-proportional resonant (PR) control methods, the proposed HP-PI controller has a strong ability to balance NP voltage with a good dynamic and steady-state performance under varied unbalanced grid conditions, which also improves the quality of grid currents.