Impact of inverter digital time delay on the harmonic characteristics of grid‐connected large‐scale photovoltaic system

Abstract

The digitally controlled inverter is widely applied to the photovoltaic (PV) plant, however, the effects of inverter digital time delay on the harmonic characteristic of PV system which directly influences the power quality and even the stability of the system, have not been investigated yet. This study investigates the harmonic characteristic of a grid-connected large-scale PV system based on the equivalent Norton model of the system with considering the digital time delay of the inverter. According to the system equivalent model, the series harmonic resonance circuit and the parallel harmonic resonance circuit are divided to study the impacts of digital time delay in the cases of the inverter output harmonic exist and the grid voltage harmonic exit, respectively. Then, the harmonic resonance mechanism of a grid-connected large-scale PV system is studied and the effects of digital time delay on the harmonic characteristic of system output current is quantitatively analysed by defining the harmonic magnification coefficient. It turns out that frequency and magnitude of harmonic magnification points in the grid-side current of the system are increased as the digital time delay increases. Reference to the actual 20 MWp grid-connected PV system, a simulation model is built to verify the theoretical analysis results.