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Compact Analytical Solutions For Determining The Spectral Characteristics of Multicarrier-Based Multilevel PWM
Compact Analytical Solutions For Determining The Spectral Characteristics of Multicarrier-Based Multilevel PWM
Compact Analytical Solutions For Determining The Spectral Characteristics of Multicarrier-Based Multilevel PWM
Abstract—Multilevel pulsewidth modulation (PWM) has be- performance and efficiency. An analytical study on the spectral
come very important in high-power applications in recent years. characteristics of various control strategies has been reported
Many different types of topology and control strategy have been elsewhere, and this paper will only concentrate on the study of
developed to cater for the increasing need. One of the major con-
cerns of the control strategy is to reduce the undesirable harmonics multicarrier-based sinusoidal PWM. As indicated in the anal-
in order to improve the performance and efficiency. This paper ysis of the two-level PWM by Bennett [9], double Fourier se-
presents the derivation of analytical solutions for determining the ries is proven to be the most convenient tool for analyzing the
spectral characteristics of the multicarrier-based multilevel sinu- nonlinear PWM problem. The first attempt to develop analyt-
soidal PWM. By decomposing the multilevel PWM into a series of ical expression for the multilevel PWM spectrum has been re-
sub-PWM and followed by using double Fourier series analysis,
compact analytical solutions for any level with any carrier phase ported by Carrara et al. [4]. However, his derivation involves a
disposition have been obtained. Closed-form solutions have also fairly complicated decomposition of the PWM waveform, and
been derived for double-sided multilevel PWM under certain the analytical solution is not easy to use. In the recent work re-
specific carrier phase settings. The analytical solutions have been ported by Holms [10]–[12], new sets of analytical solutions for
cross verified extensively with simulations and the results match naturally and regularly sampled multilevel PWM have been de-
with each other very well. It is shown that the proposed analytical
solutions are by far the most compact reported in the literature.
rived. Though the analysis is simple enough to follow, the solu-
tion is still rather complicated and the solution is only applied to
Index Terms—Double Fourier series, multilevel pulsewidth mod- odd-level PWM. The authors have also used the double Fourier
ulation (PWM) inverter, spectral characteristics. series to analyze the multilevel SPWM and reported the results
in [13]. Since the analysis was carried out in a way that the
I. INTRODUCTION symmetrical properties of signal interaction has not yet been ex-
ploited, the analytical solution is still a bit cumbersome. After
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1578 IEEE TRANSACTIONS ON CIRCUITS AND SYSTEMS—I: REGULAR PAPERS, VOL. 51, NO. 8, AUGUST 2004
Fig. 3. Interaction between the ith positive carrier C and the modulating
PWM, an even number of carriers is required, whereas an odd
number of carriers is required to generate an even-level PWM,
0
signal V with a dc bias of (1 2i).
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LAU et al.: COMPACT ANALYTICAL SOLUTIONS FOR DETERMINING SPECTRAL CHARACTERISTICS 1579
(7)
The final multilevel PWM function can be obtained
by summing up all the 3-D functions, and ,
generated by individual positive as well as negative carriers.
B. Spectral Characteristics
Since is a periodic function in terms of both and
with a period of , it can be represented using double Fourier
series as follows:
Fig. 5. Interaction between the ith negative carrier C and the modulating
signal V with a dc bias of (2i 1).0
(8)
Substituting (2)–(7) into
(9)
Fig. 6. Definition of pulsewidth for a single cycle of a negative carrier. for positive and negative carriers are given, respectively,
as
Since the PWM output voltage is a function of two variables
and , it can be represented by a three-dimensional (3-D) model
[14]. Considering both Figs. 3 and 4, a 3-D PWM model func-
tion can be defined for the th positive carrier and can
be written as
(10)
(4)
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1580 IEEE TRANSACTIONS ON CIRCUITS AND SYSTEMS—I: REGULAR PAPERS, VOL. 51, NO. 8, AUGUST 2004
(19)
In order to have a complete view on the effects to the spectrum
due to various phase dispositions, phase shift is introduced to (23a)
(20)
(21)
(22)
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LAU et al.: COMPACT ANALYTICAL SOLUTIONS FOR DETERMINING SPECTRAL CHARACTERISTICS 1581
(23b)
(24a)
Fig. 8. Multicarrier cascaded multilevel PWM inverter topology used for the
analysis.
(26)
(27)
(28)
(29)
(30)
(31)
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1582 IEEE TRANSACTIONS ON CIRCUITS AND SYSTEMS—I: REGULAR PAPERS, VOL. 51, NO. 8, AUGUST 2004
B. Simulation Results
Pspice and Matlab have been used to verify these general so-
lutions extensively, and their validity has been confirmed. De-
spite the fact that it may not be practical to set the phases of the
carriers and modulating signal arbitrarily, the proposed solution
is able to evaluate the phase effects on the spectral components.
Figs. 9 and 10 show the simulated and analytical results for four-
and five-level double-sided PWM spectra, and the phase dispo-
sitions are purposely made to be arbitrary, which is uncommon
for verifying the validity of the proposed analytical solutions.
Overmodulation is also one of the concerns for multilevel PWM,
and the proposed solution allows us to have a close examina-
tion of the output spectrum when overmodulation occurs. Fig. 11
shows the spectra obtained from simulation and analytical solu-
tion of a five-level PWM with overmodulation, . The
above examples demonstrate that the simulated and analytical re-
sults match very well. Although hardware implementation has
not been carried out, the proposed solution has been cross ver-
ified by comparing the experimental result of a five-level cas-
Fig. 9. Spectrum of a double-sided four-level PWM with f = 50 Hz, f =
caded PWM inverter reported in [12] and the analytical spec- 2100 Hz, M = 0:9, = =4, = 0, and = =3. (a) Simulation result.
trum matches that of the experimental spectrum very well. (b) Analytical result.
(33)
(34)
(35)
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LAU et al.: COMPACT ANALYTICAL SOLUTIONS FOR DETERMINING SPECTRAL CHARACTERISTICS 1583
Fig. 10. Spectrum of a double-sided five-level PWM with f = 50 Hz, f = Fig. 11. Spectrum of a double-sided five-level PWM with f = 50 Hz, f =
2100 Hz, M = 0:9, = =3, = , = =4, and = 6=5. 2100 Hz, and M = 1:2. (a) Simulation result. (b) Analytical result.
(a) Simulation result. (b) Analytical result.
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1584 IEEE TRANSACTIONS ON CIRCUITS AND SYSTEMS—I: REGULAR PAPERS, VOL. 51, NO. 8, AUGUST 2004
into the analysis is inevitably complicated, and it is unlikely that assumption that the signal must be periodic. If the ratio of
a compact solution will be obtained. the carrier and modulating signal frequencies is not a rational
Finally, it should be noted that the proposed solution is number, the PWM signal is not periodic and the analytical
obtained based on double Fourier analysis which has a basic solution cannot be applied. It is also of interest to point out that
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LAU et al.: COMPACT ANALYTICAL SOLUTIONS FOR DETERMINING SPECTRAL CHARACTERISTICS 1585
all even harmonics will be eliminated due to the odd half-wave [12] , “Multicarrier PWM strategies for multilevel inverters,” IEEE
symmetry if the ratio is an odd integer, and this property may Trans. Ind. Electron., vol. 49, pp. 858–867, Aug. 2002.
[13] C. M. Wu, W. H. Lau, and H. Chung, “Generic analytical solution for
also help control the harmonics. calculating the harmonic characteristics of multilevel sinusoidal PWM
inverter,” in Proc. 1999 IEEE ISCAS, vol. 5, 1999, pp. 184–187.
V. CONCLUSION [14] , “Analytical technique for calculating the output harmonics of an
H-bridge inverter with dead time,” IEEE Trans. Circuits Syst. I, vol. 46,
This paper presents an elegant approach to derive the general pp. 617–627, May 1999.
solutions for various multicarrier-based multilevel PWM strate-
gies. The main idea is to sum up all the PWM waveforms ob-
tained by decomposing the multilevel PWM into a number of
W. H. Lau (M’88) received the B.Sc. and Ph.D. de-
sub-PWM waveforms. The general solutions have been verified grees in electrical and electronic engineering from
using Pspice and Matlab simulations extensively. The proposed University of Portsmouth, Portsmouth, U.K., in 1985
approach offers the following advantages: 1) easy understanding and 1989, respectively.
In 1990, he joined the City University of Hong
of the derivation; 2) adaptability for arbitrary carrier phase and Kong, where he is currently an Associate Professor
modulating signal phase disposition; 3) only a simple numerical in the Department of Computer Engineering and In-
integration technique is required to compute the analytical solu- formation Technology. His current research interests
are in the area of digital signal processing, digital
tion; 4) the overmodulation situation is also taken into account; audio engineering, visual speech signal processing.
and 5) a compact closed-form solution can be obtained for spe- Dr. Lau is currently the Vice-Chairman of the IEEE
cific carrier phase disposition. These general solutions provide Hong Kong Section. He is the Financial Chair of the TENCON 2006. He was
the recipient of the IEEE Third Millennium Medal. He was the Registration
a very convenient tool for researchers who would like to have Co-Chair of the ICASSP 2003 and ISCAS 1997. He was the Chairman of the
an in-depth insight into the spectrum of multicarrier-based mul- IEEE Hong Kong Joint Chapter on CAS/COM for 1997 and 1998.
tilevel PWM with arbitrary phase disposition.
REFERENCES
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PWM inverter,” IEEE Trans. Ind. Applicat., vol. IA-17, pp. 518–523, and electronic engineering from Shanghai Jiaotong
Sept. 1981. University, Shanghai, China, in 2001. He is currently
[2] X. Yuang, H. Stemmler, and I. Barbi, “Self-balancing of the clamping- working toward the Ph.D. degree from the City Uni-
capacitor-voltages in the multilevel capacitor-clamping-inverter under versity of Hong Kong.
sub-harmonic PWM modulation,” IEEE Trans. Power Electron., vol. 6, His research interests include digital signal pro-
pp. 256–263, Mar. 2001. cessing, digital audio engineering, and fundamental
[3] F. Z. Peng and J. S. Lai, “Dynamic performance and control of a star var control principles for power electronic converters.
compensator using cascade multilevel inverters,” in Rec. Conf. IEEE-IAS
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[5] T. Nakajima, H. Suzuki, K. Sakamoto, M. Shigeta, H. Yamamoto, Y.
Miyazaki, S. Tanaka, and S. Saito, “Multiple space vector control for Henry S. H. Chung (S’92–M’95–SM’03) received
self-commutated power converters,” IEEE Trans. Power Delivery, vol. the B.Eng. (with first class honors) and Ph.D. degrees
13, pp. 1418–1424, Oct. 1998. in electrical engineering from The Hong Kong Poly-
[6] L. Li, D. Czarkowski, Y. Liu, and P. Pillay, “Multilevel selective technic University in 1991 and 1994, respectively.
harmonic elimination PWM technique in series-connected voltage Since 1995, he has been with the City Univer-
inverters,” IEEE Trans. Ind. Applicat., vol. 36, pp. 160–170, Jan./Feb. sity of Hong Kong. He is currently an Associate
2000. Professor with the Department of Electronic En-
[7] Z. Suto and I. Nagy, “Analysis of nonlinear phenomena and design as- gineering. His research interests include time- and
pects of three-phase space-vector-modulated converters,” IEEE Trans. frequency-domain analysis of power electronic
Circuits Syst. I, vol. 50, pp. 1064–1071, Aug. 2003. circuits, switched-capacitor-based converters,
[8] J. Rodriguez, Ed., IEEE Transactions on Industiral Electronics, Special random-switching techniques, digital audio ampli-
Issue on Multilevel Inverters, Aug. 2002, vol. 49. fiers, soft-switching converters, and electronic ballast design. He has authored
[9] W. R. Bennett, “New results in the calculation of modulation products,” four research book chapters and over 160 technical papers including 76 refereed
Bell Syst. Tech. J., vol. 12, pp. 228–243, 1933. journal papers in the current research area, and holds four U.S. patents.
[10] D. G. Holmes, “A general analytical method for determining the theo- Dr. Chung was track chair of the technical committee on power electronics
retical harmonic components of carrier based PWM strategies,” in Rec. circuits and power systems of IEEE Circuits and Systems Society in 1997–1998.
Conf. IEEE-IAS Annu. Meeting, vol. 2, Oct 1998, pp. 1207–1214. He was Associate Editor and Guest Editor of the IEEE TRANSACTIONS ON
[11] B. P. McGrath and D. G. Holmes, “An analytical technique for the de- CIRCUITS AND SYSTEMS–Part I: FUNDAMENTAL THEORY AND APPLICATIONS.
termination of spectral components of multilevel carrier-based PWM He was the receipient of the Grand Applied Research Excellence Award in
methods,” IEEE Trans. Ind. Electron., vol. 49, pp. 847–857, Aug. 2002. 2001 from the City University of Hong Kong.
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