A Back-to-Back 2L-3L Grid Integration of a Marine Current Energy Converter

Senad Apelfröjd, Rickard Ekström, Karin Thomas and Mats Leijon
Additional contact information
Senad Apelfröjd: Division of Electricity, Swedish Centre for Renewable Electric Energy Conversion, Uppsala University, P.O. Box 534, 751 21 Uppsala, Sweden
Rickard Ekström: Division of Electricity, Swedish Centre for Renewable Electric Energy Conversion, Uppsala University, P.O. Box 534, 751 21 Uppsala, Sweden
Karin Thomas: Division of Electricity, Swedish Centre for Renewable Electric Energy Conversion, Uppsala University, P.O. Box 534, 751 21 Uppsala, Sweden
Mats Leijon: Division of Electricity, Swedish Centre for Renewable Electric Energy Conversion, Uppsala University, P.O. Box 534, 751 21 Uppsala, Sweden

Energies, 2015, vol. 8, issue 2, 1-13

Abstract: The paper proposes a back-to-back 2L-3L grid connection topology for a marine current energy converter. A prototype marine current energy converter has been deployed by a research group at Uppsala University. The concept behind the prototype revolves around a fixed pitch vertical axis turbine directly connected to a permanent magnet synchronous generator (PMSG). The proposed grid connection system utilizes a well known and proven two level voltage source converter generator-side combined with a three-level cascaded H-bridge (CHB) multilevel converter grid-side. The multilevel converter brings benefits in terms of efficiency, power quality and DC-link utilization. The system is here presented for a single marine current energy converter but can easily be scaled up for clusters of marine current energy converters. Control schemes for both grid-side and generator-side voltage source converters are presented. The start-up, steady state and dynamic performance of the marine current energy converter are investigated and simulation results are presented in this paper.

Keywords: marine current energy converter; grid connection; three-level cascaded H-bridge (search for similar items in EconPapers)
JEL-codes: Q Q0 Q4 Q40 Q41 Q42 Q43 Q47 Q48 Q49 (search for similar items in EconPapers)
Date: 2015
References: View references in EconPapers View complete reference list from CitEc
Citations: View citations in EconPapers (1)

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