Abstract

PPT

A New Adjustable-Speed Drives (ASD) System Based on High-Performance Z-Source Inverter

Xinping Ding1, Zhaoming Qian1, Shuitao Yang1, Bin Cui1, Fangzheng Peng1, 2
Zhejiang University, Hangzhou, China, 310027 College of Electrical Engineering 2 Michigan State University, East Lansing, USA Department of Electrical and Computer Engineering
Abstract- This paper presents a new adjustable-speed drives (ASD) system which based on the high-performance Z-source inverter (named high-performance Z-source inverter ASD system). It can overcome limitations of original Z-source inverter ASD system. The proposed Z-source inverter ASD system can operate at wide range load (even no-load) with small inductor which is very suitable for ASD system, eliminate the possibility of the DC-link voltage aberrances, simplify the Z-source network inductor and controller design, increase the inverter modulation index M, thus, decrease the ripple current by changing the magnitude and distribution of the harmonics and then decrease the iron loss of the motor. The operation modes, voltage relationship of the proposed Z-source inverter ASD system, and a partly PAM/PWM control strategy, which consists with the V/f law, have been described in detail. Finally, simulation and experimental results verified the validity of the proposed high-performance Z-source inverter ASD system. Index terms- shoot-through, buck-boost, Z-source inverter, lightload, ASD, voltage sags.
1

Light-load operation is the problem in Z-source inverter based ASD system. The DC-link voltage is increasing infinitely when the system operated with light-load as shown in Fig. 3 (b), which causes voltage-aberrances at the DC-link shown in Fig. 3 (a). The DC-link voltage will be uncontrollable and the system is unstable. Since light-load operation is the significant situation of the adjustable-speed drives, the original Z-source inverter ASD system can not obtain the high performance due to its light-load operation limitation. This paper presents a high-performance Z-source inverter ASD system, which can overcome the aforementioned limitations of original Z-source inverter ASD system [3].
Diode-Rectifier
3L s
C

b)

3-Phase Inverter
+

I.

INTRODUCTION

The application of adjustable-speed drives (ASDs) in commercial and industrial facilities is increasing due to improved efficiency, energy savings, and process control. The traditional adjustable-speed drives system is based on the voltage-source inverter, which consists of a diode rectifier frond end, dc link capacitor, and inverter bridge, as shown in Fig. 1. It suffers some common limitations and problems. 1) Obtainable output is limited quite below the input line voltage, 2) Voltage sags can interrupt an ASD system and shut down critical loads and processes; 3) Performance and reliability are compromised by V-source inverter structure. The recently developed Z-source inverter adjustable speed drive (ASD) system [2], as shown in Fig. 2, can: 1) produce any desired output ac voltage, even greater than the line voltage, regardless of the input voltage, thus reducing motor ratings; 2) provide ride-through during voltage sags without any additional circuits; 3) improve power factor and reduce harmonic current and common-mode voltage. However, it has many limitations as following: a) The Z-source network inductor has the limited value to guarantee the input current Iin>0. In some applications, the inductance should be minimized in order to reduce cost, volume, and weight. From [3], the design of Z-source network inductor and system control become very complex, and the output voltage becomes incontrollable with small inductor even operate in full load.

Vdc
-

Fig. 1 Traditional variable speed drive system configuration

Diode-Rectifier
3Ls
Cc Ca Cb iin

Z-network
L1 C1

3-Phase Inverter
+

C2

Vdc
-

L2

Fig. 2 The Z-Source inverter ASD system

Fig. 3 Waveforms of the DC-link voltage during operating in light-load, (a) viewed from low-frequency; (b) viewed from high-frequency.

0197-2618/07/$25.00 2007 IEEE

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A high-performance Z-source inverter ASD system can: 1) operate at wide-range load (even no load) with small Zsource inductor, 2) eliminate the possibility of the DC-link voltage aberrances, which deteriorate the output ac voltage, 3) simplify the Z-source inductor design and system control; 4) decrease the iron loss of the motor due to the inverter higher modulation index, which profit from the partly PAM/PWM control, 5) provide ride-through during voltage sags without any additional circuits, 6) Improve the reliability due to the special Z-source network structure. In this paper, the high-performance Z-source inverter ASD system configuration, its operating modes, voltage relationships, and a partly PAM/PWM control method are analyzed and discussed. Simulation and experimental results are included to prove the concept and demonstrate the features of the proposed ASD system. II. HIGH-PERFORMANCE Z-SOURCE INVERTER Fig. 4 shows the main circuit configuration of the proposed high-performance Z-source inverter ASD system. The differences between original Z-source inverter ASD system and high-performance inverter ASD system are that the input small capacitors (Ca, Cb, Cc) have been replaced by DC-link capacitor C which supplies current path during the shoot-through states and light-load condition, and an extra switch SW7 is provided. Actually, it evolved from the general Z-source inverter topology as shown in Fig. 5 [4].
3-P Diode Rectifier

operation modes as two basic modes in view of the voltage relationships as shown in Fig. 6. The equivalent circuits of proposed inverter are quite similar to Fig. 9 and Fig. 10 in [1], which are the two basic equivalent operation modes. Though, we presented 7 operation modes in Fig. 6 [5], it is described from the current relationships. Viewed from the voltage relationship, the proposed high-performance Z-source inverter ASD system has two operation modes as described in [1], with small Z-source inductor at light-load condition. The voltage ratio Vin / Vdc determined only by the shoot-through duty cycle D0 , and is independent on the load, which simplifies DC-link voltage control at wide-range load (even no load). Thus, all the relationships described in detail in [1] about the Z-source network capacitor voltage, shoot-through duty cycle, and output voltage hold true for the proposed Z-source inverter ASD system which operate at wide-range load. These relationships are summarized as
Vc1 = Vc 2 = Vc = 1 D0 Vin 1 2 D0

(1) (2)

vac =

M Vin 2(1 2 D0 )

where D0 is the shoot-through duty cycle, vac is the peak value of the ac output phase voltage, V0 is the DC-link output voltage.
D7
I L1

Vin

C
IL2

VC1

VC 2

+ I i

D7

Vin

C
IL2

I L1

VC1

VC 2

+ I i

Z-Source Network 3-P inverter

sw7
C
C1

3Ls

L1

C2 Vdc L2

Ac Motor

+ +V

Vin

C1

VC 2

Fig. 4 Proposed High-Performance Z-Source inverter

Z-Source Network

(a)
D7

L1

+
C2 V dc

Vin

C1
L2

+
Ac load or Motor

sw7 Iin
C

I L1

Vin

VC 1

IL2

VC 2V

++

dc

I L1

Vin

VC 1

IL2

++ V C 2 Vdc

Fig. 5 General Z-Source inverter topology

The possible operation modes of the proposed Z-source inverter ASD system with the simple control strategy is described in detail in [5]. In one switching cycle, it has 7 operation modes as shown in Fig. 6 in [5]. We generalize the 7

(b) Fig. 6 The basic two equivalent operation modes. (a) shoot-through state (upper sketch); (b) non-shoot through states (lower sketch)

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III. PARTLY PAM/PWM CONTROL STRATEGY FOR HIGHPERFORMANCE Z-SOURCE INVERTER ASD SYSTEM A. A partly PAM/PWM control method As described in [6], [7] and [8], the modulation index M plays an important role on the motor iron losses and the ripple current below base speed. As a consequence, in order to reduce the iron losses it is better to operate with the highest allowed modulation index. In particular, for applications where the energetic performances are important in comparison with the dynamic ones, the use of inverters with fixed and high modulation index and variable dc bus voltage can be considered as a suitable solution. The standard mode of operation of an ASD is to maintain the DC-link voltage ( Vdc ) at a constant value and adjust the modulation index M to control the output voltage. In order to obtain the rated 380 V rms output voltage, the DC-link voltage is boosted to somewhat higher level, for example Vdc = 770 V . In the proposed Z-source inverter ASD system, in order to make the inverter operate with higher modulation index, we utilize the subsection control algorithm to control the dc bus voltage, which also consist with V/f law. The control block diagram is shown in Fig. 7, it including: (a) DC-link voltage versus time; (b) modulation index versus time; (c) frequency versus time; and (d) constant V/f law. During the time interval 0 ~ t1 , the DC-link voltage maintains constant Vdc = 510 V , while the modulation index changes from M = 0.12 to M = 1 (unitary modulation index), that is to say, the PWM method has been used. During the time interval t1 ~ t2 , the modulation index M maintains constant M = 0.84 , and the DC-link voltage changes from Vdc = 510 V to Vdc = 770 V . This allows an alternate mode of controlling an ASD combining Pulse Amplitude Modulation, (PAM) and PWM, named PAM/PWM control strategy. The correspond control methods between DC-link voltage and the modulation index is shown in Fig. 7 (a), (b). With this corresponding control algorithm, the constant V/f law is fulfilled and then the higher modulation index M is obtained.
* Vdc (V )

Partly PAM/PWM based open loop V/f control It should be noted that all the VVVF control strategy can be applied to the proposed Z-source inverter ASD system. This paper focused on the open loop V/f control. The open loop V/f control of an induction motor is by far the most popular method of speed control because of its simplicity, and these types of motors are widely used in industry. The traditional open loop V/f control maintains DC-link voltage constant, only control the modulation index (PWM) to follow V/f law. In order to obtain the rated 380 V rms output voltage, the DC-link voltage has to boost to somewhat higher level, take Vdc =770 V for example, which caused the lower modulation index M. Combined the partly PAM/PWM control and open loop V/f control, the proposed partly PAM/PWM based open loop V/f control is shown in Fig. 8. The power circuit consists of a diode rectifier with a three-phase ac supply, input capacitor C, and PWM Z-source inverter.
3-P Diode Rectifier

B.

Z-Source Network 3-Phase inverter

3Ls

SW7
C C1

L1

C2 Vdc
L2

Ac Motor

* Vdc

Vdc (t )

vdc

Sensing
Controller

D0

t (s )

+
M

V / f law

f*

t (s )

f (t ) Vac
f

S1~6

PWM Generator

Fig. 8 Control block diagram of proposed Z-source inverter based ASD system.

750 610 510

t1 t2 Time t (s) DC-link voltage versus time ( a)

f (Hz)
50 42
10

Vac (V )

t1 t ( s ) Modulation versus tim e (b ) 310 255

Fig. 7 Control algorithm which following constant V/f law.

t1 t2 Time t (s) Frequency versus time (c )

30
10 42 50 Frequency f (Hz) V/f Law (d )

Compared with the traditional constant DC-link voltage control strategy, the partly PAM/PWM control method operated with lower DC-link voltage Vdc = 510 V , not Vdc = 770 V , during the lower speed operation. That is to say, the shoot-through duty-cycle D0 equal to zero during the lower speed condition. By reducing the DC-link voltage Vdc , M can be increased as shown in Fig. 11 which will then decrease the ripple current by changing the magnitude and distribution of harmonics. It is very obviously that the voltage stress across the switches becomes smaller. The frequency f * is the primary control variable because it is approximately equal to speed f r . The phase voltage Vac is directly generated from the frequency command by the V/f law. * The DC-link voltage Vdc command is given as shown in Fig. 7 (a). As the frequency becomes small at low speed, the stator resistance tends to absorb the major amount of the stator voltage, thus weakening the flux. The boost ac voltage Vdc = 30 V is

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added so that the rated flux and corresponding full torque become available down to zero speed shown in Fig. 7 (d). IV. SIMULATION AND EXPERIMENTAL RESULTS
A. Simulation results The analytical and operating principle of the proposed Zsource inverter ASD system presented in this paper is firstly verified with the simulation. The simulation parameters are as follows: a) 3-phase line voltage: 380 V b) Input capacitor ( C ): C=500 F c) Z-source network: L1 =L 2 =500 H , C1 =C 2 =500 F d) Switching frequency: f s =10 kHz It is noted that the dc-link voltage aberrance has happened in either the light-load or the small Z-source network inductors. The comparison simulation results between original Zsource inverter ASD system and proposed Z-source inverter ASD system with small Z-source inductor have been shown in Fig.9. It can be seen that the DC-link voltage of traditional Zsource inverter ASD system has aberranced during the nonshoot-through states when operating in light-load condition, while the proposed Z-source inverter system DC-link voltage has maintained constant as shown in Fig. 9.

Vdc , sam

vac

Fig. 11 The sensed DC-link voltage (top) and output ac voltage followed V/f law (bottom) with partly PAM/PWM control. Modulation index of partly PAM/PWM control

Modulation index of traditional control

Fig. 10 and Fig. 11 shows the comparison results between traditional PWM control and proposed partly PAM/PWM control both used in high-performance Z-source inverter ASD system. We can see that with the partly PAM/PWM control, the DC-link voltage Vdc = 510 V is lower than that Vdc = 770 V with the traditional PWM control during the low frequency 42Hz , thus, the higher modulation index is obtained as shown in Fig. 12. The simulation results in Figs. 9-12 are consistent with the theoretical analysis, which verifies the previous analysis and the operating modes concept.
Fig. 9 DC-link voltages for Z-source inverter (upper graph) and Highperformance Z-source inverter (lower graph) both with small Z-source inductor

Fig. 12 Comparison modulation index (lower graph) between proposed partly PAM/PWM control and PWM control method.

Vdc , sam

vac

Fig. 10 The sensed DC-link voltage (top) and output ac voltage followed V/f law (bottom) with traditional PWM control.

B. Experimental results Fig. 13 shows the waveforms of the original Z-source inverter working at light-load, the voltage aberrances at DC-link voltage occurred, therefore, the DC-link voltage is uncontrolled. It is very clear that the peak DC-link voltage of the highperformance Z-source maintains constant value during the nonshoot-through states, and it is quite consistent with the theoretical value Vdc = Vin (1 2 D0 ) = 510 /(1 2 0.15) =728 V as shown in Fig. 14. Figs. 15 and 16 show the output ac phase voltage harmonic RMS value of the traditional Z-source inverter ASD system and proposed Z-source inverter ASD system operated in the light-load R = 510 , respectively. The proposed Z-source inverter ASD system output ac voltage has less THD than the traditional Z-source inverter ASD system.

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Fig. 13 DC-link voltage Vdc of traditional Z-source inverter (top) and Z-source network inductor current (bottom) operate in light-load (510).

Fig. 17 DC-link voltage (upper graph) output ac voltage (lower graph) with partly PAM/PWM control method.

Fig. 14 DC-link voltage of High-performance Z-source inverter (top) and Zsource network inductor current (bottom) operate in light-load (510).

Fig. 18 DC-link voltage (upper graph) output ac voltage (lower graph) with partly PAM/PWM control method.

Fig. 15 The output ac voltage THD of the original Z-source inverter ASD system operated in light-load condition (510).

Fig. 19 DC-link voltage (upper graph) and output ac voltage (lower graph) with the traditional PWM control method.

Fig. 16 The output ac voltage THD of the proposed Z-source inverter ASD system operated in light-load condition (510).

Fig. 20 DC-link voltage (upper graph) and output ac voltage (lower graph) with the traditional PWM control method.

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The experimental results agree with the analysis and simulation results very well. The validity of the operation modes, control algorithm, and analysis are verified. V. CONCLUSIONS Based on the high-performance Z-source inverter, a novel high-performance Z-source inverter ASD system is proposed in this paper, it can overcome the limitations and drawbacks of the original Z-source inverter ASD system. The DC-link voltage of the proposed ASD system is independent on the load. Therefore, it can operate in light-load (even no-load) with small Z-source network inductor normally, eliminate the possibility of the DClink voltage aberrances, and simplify the Z-source inductor design and system control. A partly PAM/PWM control method of the inverter is presented, which brings some benefits: lower voltage stress across the inverter switches, higher modulation index compared with the traditional PWM control. The voltage relationships, and control strategy for switch SW7 has been described. Finally, experimental results verified the validity of the proposed high-performance Z-source inverter ASD system. ACKNOWLEDGMENT This work was supported by National Natural Science Foundation of China (NSFC) (50377038). Figs. 13-22 show the experimental results of the highperformance Z-source inverter ASD system controlled by partly PAM/PWM control method and the traditional PWM control respectively. The modulation index of proposed control method and traditional method are shown in Fig. 21-22. It is very clear that a higher modulation index is obtained with proposed control method compared with the traditional control method. The voltage stress across the inverter devices with traditional PWM control strategy and partly PWM/PAM control strategy with output ac phase peak voltage variation is shown in Fig. 23.
Voltage stress across switches (V)
900 800
700 600 500 400

Fig. 21 The modulation index M with proposed partly PAM/PWM control method

Fig. 22 The modulation index M with traditional PWM control method.

REFERENCE
[1] F. Z. Peng, Z-Source Inverter, IEEE Transaction on Industry Application, vol.39, No.2, pp. 504-510, March/April 2003. [2] F. Z. Peng, A. Joseph, J. Wang, M. S. Shen, L. Chen, and Z. G. Pan, ZSource Inverter for motor drives, IEEE Transaction on power electronics, vol.20, No.4, pp. 857-863, July 2005. [3] Miaosen Shen, and Fang Z. Peng, Operation Modes and Characteristics of the Z-Source Inverter with Small Inductance, IEEE IAS 2005, pp. 12531260 [4] Longya Xu, and Jingbo Liu, Comparison Study of DC-DC-AC Combined Converter for Integrated Starter Generator Applications, IEEE IPEMC 2005, pp.1130-1135 [5] Xinping Ding, Zhaoming Qian, Shuitao Yang, Bin Cui, and F. Z. Peng, A High-Performance Z-Source Inverter Operate with Both Small Inductor and Light-Load, IEEE APEC 2006, pp. 615-620. [6] Aldo Boglietti, Paolo Ferraris, Mario Lazzari, and Michele Pastorelli, Influence of the Inverter Characteristics on the Iron Losses in PWM Inverter-Fed Induction Motors, IEEE Transaction on Industry Application, vol. 32, No. 5, pp. 1190-1194, September/October 1996. [7] A. Boglietti, A. Cavagnino, M. Lazzari, and M. Pastorelli, Electrical Drives to Increase the Fluid Processing Efficiency, IEEE IAS 2001, pp. 1147-1154 [8] F D. Kieferndorf, M. Foster, and T. A. Lipo, Ruduction of DC Bus Capacitor Ripple Current with PAM/PWM Converter, IEEE Transaction on Industry Applications, vol.40, No.2, pp. 607-614, March/April 2004.

DC-link voltage=constant Modulation index=variable

Modulation index=partly variable 300 DC-link voltage=partly variable 200 100 0 0 30 70 110 150 190 230 270 Output ac phase peak voltage vac (V)

310

Fig. 23 Voltage stress across switches versus output ac phase peak voltage during the VVVF operating condition with constant V/f law

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