A Fault Tolerant Control Technique for Hybrid Modular Multi-Level Converters with Fault Detection Capability

Mahmoud Abdelsalam; Mostafa Ibrahim Marei; Hatem Yassin Diab; Sarath B. Tennakoon

A Fault Tolerant Control Technique for Hybrid Modular Multi-Level Converters with Fault Detection Capability

Mahmoud Abdelsalam

Mostafa Ibrahim Marei

Hatem Yassin Diab

Sarath B. Tennakoon

Vol. 18, No. 2, pp. 558-572, Mar. 2018

10.6113/JPE.2018.18.2.558

Fault detection unit

Fault tolerant control unit

Hardware in the loop

Hybrid modular multilevel converter

Recursive least square

PDF Full-Text

Abstract

In addition to its modular nature, a Hybrid Modular Multilevel Converter (HMMC) assembled from half-bridge and full-bridge sub-modules, is able to block DC faults with a minimum number of switching devices, which makes it attractive for high power applications. This paper introduces a control strategy based on the Root-Least Square (RLS) algorithm to estimate the capacitor voltages instead of using direct measurements. This action eliminates the need for voltage transducers in the HMMC sub-modules and the associated communication link with the central controller. In addition to capacitor voltage balancing and suppression of circulating currents, a fault tolerant control unit (FTCU) is integrated into the proposed strategy to modify the parameters of the HMMC controller. On advantage of the proposed FTCU is that it does not need extra components. Furthermore, a fault detection unit is adapted by utilizing a hybrid estimation scheme to detect sub-module faults. The behavior of the suggested technique is assessed using PSCAD offline simulations. In addition, it is validated using a real-time digital simulator connected to a real time controller under various normal and fault conditions. The proposed strategy shows robust performance in terms of accuracy and time response since it succeeds in stabilizing the HMMC under faults.

Statistics

Show / Hide Statistics

Cumulative Counts from September 30th, 2019
Multiple requests among the same browser session are counted as one view. If you mouse over a chart, the values of data points will be shown.

Cite this article

[IEEE Style]

M. Abdelsalam, M. I. Marei, H. Y. Diab, S. B. Tennakoon, "A Fault Tolerant Control Technique for Hybrid Modular Multi-Level Converters with Fault Detection Capability," Journal of Power Electronics, vol. 18, no. 2, pp. 558-572, 2018. DOI: 10.6113/JPE.2018.18.2.558.

[ACM Style]

Mahmoud Abdelsalam, Mostafa Ibrahim Marei, Hatem Yassin Diab, and Sarath B. Tennakoon. 2018. A Fault Tolerant Control Technique for Hybrid Modular Multi-Level Converters with Fault Detection Capability. Journal of Power Electronics, 18, 2, (2018), 558-572. DOI: 10.6113/JPE.2018.18.2.558.