2019 International Conference on Computing, Power and Communication Technologies (GUCON)

Galgotias University, Greater Noida, UP, India. Sep 27-28, 2019

Dual Input Converter Fed Transformerless

Multilevel Inverter for Standalone PV Application
Allamsetty Hema Chander Lalit Kumar Sahu, Member IEEE Manik Jalhotra
Department of Electrical Engineering Department of Electrical Engineering Department of Electrical Engineering
National Institute of Technology National Institute of Technology National Institute of Technology
Raipur, India Raipur, India Raipur, India
ahemachander01@gmail.com lkumar.ele@nitrr.ac.in manikjalhotra619@gmail.com

Abstract— Most of the transformers less photovoltaic tracking the MPPT of individual panels; however, due to
inverters fail to extract maximum power from each panel increase in number of DC/DC converters the component
especially during partial shading conditions. In this regard, a count increases resulting in high cost and decreased
dual input based dual stage transformer less multilevel reliability. Another series connected structure in individual
inverter for maximum power extraction from each panel is
proposed in this paper. The proposed dual input structure
panel is connected to an inverter, and these are further
extracts the maximum power form each panel at all operating connected in series and then to the load or grid as shown in
scenarios. The T-type multilevel inverter is used for DC/AC Fig.1d [7], [8]. This generally employs H-bridge inverter
conversion. The proposed structure offers advantages of and has several advantages like simple structure and less
simplicity, reliability and control flexibility. The key advantage component count compared to the previous version of series
of the transformerless topology presented is that without any based structure. However, since it is a buck topology, the
complex modulation strategies nor is any additional feasibility for standalone applications is limited due to
components/complex circuitry, the leakage currents in the constraint on the number of series connected panels and
permissible limits as per German standards. The proposed increased component count.
topology is comprehensively analyzed for different operating
scenarios in MATLAB/Simulink environment.
DC
DC DC
Keywords— Transformer less inverter, maximum power
extraction, leakage current, Photovoltaic system

DC AC
I. INTRODUCTION AC

The transformerless PV inverters for residential (a) (b)

DC
applications are of gaining high interest in the recent past. In DC
DC
this regard, numerous tranformerless inverter topologies
DC
have been proposed in the literature. Among the available AC

structures centralized single stage transformerless inverter DC

DC
shown in Fig.1a has gained importance. These structures are
connected to a single or multiple PV strings and then to the DC AC
grid or load [1], [2]. Another type of transformerless AC

inverter structures that gained equal importance are (c) (d)

DC
replacement of single stage conversion with dual stage DC
DC
conversion as shown in Fig.1b [3], [4]. Both these structures
AC
have high efficiencies and low cost. However, they lack DC

tracking of maximum power point tacking (MPPT)

DC DC
capability for individual panels, which results in a huge loss
in power extraction especially during partial shading. Also, AC
DC AC
the series connection of a number of panels results in high
(e) (f)
DC link voltage that could further result in a dangerous high
Fig.1. Classical Single phase transformerless PV inverters (a) single stage
voltage arc fault. (b) two stage (c) series connected two stage (d) series connected single
To address these issues, single panel based inverters are stage (e) parallel connected two stage (f) parallel connected single stage
gaining have been proposed and gained popularity due to
their better MPPT capabilities. These series connected Another solution available is parallel type structure. In
structures provide an option to enhance the voltage in order this similar to series panel based solution, each panel is
to meet the requirement. These structures have an individual connected to individual converter for MPPT and further
panel connected to a non-isolated converter and these are connected in parallel. Finally these parallel connected
further connected in series. Finally, the series connected converters are connected to centralized inverter as shown in
DC/DC converters are connected to centralized inverter as Fig.1e [9], [10]. These effectively extract the maximum
shown in Fig.1c [5], [6]. This solution is highly efficient in

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power from individual panel, however similar to series
connected panels suffer from high component count.
Another parallel type solution available is parallel isolated
d1
DC/AC inverters, termed as micro-inverters, which has S1

proven success in the market. This structure is shown in t

Fig.1f [11], [12]. These are proven to successfully harvest
maximum power under all conditions in a simple and S2 d2
flexible manner. However, this requires a high step up
isolated converter which increases the magnetic components t1 t2 t

resulting in increased cost and limited efficiency compared Fig. 3. Switching scheme for dual input structure
to transformerless string inverters.
The literature discussed suffers from one or more of the From Fig.3 it is evident that the PV panels are
following limitations: fail to extract MPP, increased independent of their operation and the duty of the switches
component count due to more number of DC/DC converters Spv1 and Spv2 are controlled by their respective MPPT
or DC/AC inverters, increased magnetic components. In this algorithms. This ensures that the PV panels extract
regard, a dual input structure for extracting the maximum maximum power under all conditions especially partial
power from each panel is proposed and is connected to shading on one of the panels does not affect the operating
conventional boost converter for enhancing the voltage level point of other panel. This is achieved by time multiplexing
and is then fed to T-type multilevel inverter for DC-AC based switching scheme.
conversion. This structure extracts maximum power from The switches Spv1 and Spv2 as mentioned earlier, aid in
each panel effectively overcoming all the limitations operating the panels at respective MPPs, switch Sdc boosts
discussed above. the voltage level to the required level. The output voltage of
The paper is organized as follows: section II presents the boost converter is given as [13]
operation of the topology. Section III validates the proposed
method under different conditions followed by conclusion in V pv1 d 1  V pv 2 d 2
Section IV. V dc (1)
1  d dc
II. OPERATION OF THE PROPOSED TOPOLOGY
where Vdc is the out voltage across the capacitor Cdc (i.e.,
The proposed PV inverter topology employs a multiple after enhancing the generated voltage), d1 and d2 are
input structure cascaded to a boost converter followed by a respective duty ratios of switches Spv1 and Spv2 respectively
modified T-type multilevel inverter as shown in Fig.2. In generated by their respective MPP algorithms (P&O
this topology, individual PV panel is connected to a switch method), ddc is the duty ratio of the switch Sdc.
whose duty is controlled by the respective MPPT algorithm The voltage Vdc is now fed to the T-type multilevel
which ensures maximum power extraction from each panel inverter (MLI). The capacitors used for dividing the input
during all conditions and hence comparatively reduces the voltage in conventional T-type MLI are used as dc link
power loss during partial shading conditions. This obtained capacitors. This decreases the use of dc-link capacitor
voltage is fed to boost converter for further enhancing the resulting in increased reliability and efficiency
voltage level to meet the load requirement and then to comparatively. The switching strategy of the modified T-
DC/AC inverter. The switching strategy of the PV panels type MLI is tabulated in Table 1.
connected the dual input structure is depicted in Fig.3.

Ldc
Spv1 Ddc

Cpar1
Cpv1 Dpv1 T1 T3
Vpv1 C1

T5 V0
Spv2 Sdc LOAD
T6
Cpar2
C2
Vpv2 Cpv2 Dpv2 T4 T2

Fig.2. Structure of the proposed dual input dual stage transformerless multilevel PV inverter

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 Among various pulse width modulation (PWM) III. SIMULATION RESULTS
techniques available, multi carrier sinusoidal PWM (MC- The proposed dual input dual stage modified T-type
SPWM) technique has been used to reduce the power losses multilevel PV inverter is validated using simulation in
in comparison to unipolar PWM [14] and the corresponding MATLAB/Simulink environment. The parameters used for
generation of switching signals is shown in Fig. 4. evaluating the performance of the system are listed in Table
2.
TABLE II PARAMETERS AND THEIR VALUES
Parameter Value
Vmpp (V) 34.5
Impp (A) 4.35
Pmpp (W) 150
Ldc (mH) 2.5
Cpv1 and Cpv2 (μF) 100
C1 and C2 (μF) 1200
Load (Ω) 10
Fig.4. Generation of switching signals using MC-SPWM
fs (DC stage) (kHz) 10
fc (Carrier frequency)
TABLE I SWITCHING STATES OF MODIFIED T-TYPE MLI 5
(kHz)
Voltage Conducting
Cpar1 and Cpar2 (nF) 10
level Switches
Vdc T1, T2
For comprehensive analysis, different cases are
Vdc /2 T5, T6, T2 considered. Firstly, change in irradiance is considered on
0 T1, T3 / T2, T4 one of the panels. Initially, when both the panels are
supplied with same irradiance levels (800W/m2), both the
-Vdc /2 T3,T6, T5 panels extracted maximum power of 118W each and it is
also observed that, the panels share the load equally. At
-Vdc T3, T4 t=0.7 sec, irradiance change on second panel is considered.
It is observed that, the first panel operates near its MPP
extracting 116.8W and due to irradiance change (600W/m2),
The current paths for generation of different levels are listed the second one extracts 88.2W which is the near the MPP.
in Table III. Thus, the proposed dual input structure is proved to extract
the maximum power from each panel in partial shading
conditions. The 25% decrease in irradiance level resulted in
TABLE III CURRENT PATHS OF MODIFIED T-TYPE MLI FOR DIFFERENT decrease of 18% load voltage and 7.2% load current. This
VOLTAGE LEVEL GENERATION
scenario is depicted in Fig.5. The voltage, current and power
Voltage level Current paths of panel 1 and 2 are shown in Fig.5a and Fig.5b
respectively. The variation in irradiance results a variation
Vdc C1+ - T1 – Load - T2 - C2 – C1- in panel voltage and hence the dc link voltage. This
variation in dc link voltage reflects the load voltage and
Vdc /2 C2+ - T5 - T6 - Load - T2 - C2- current as shown in Fig.5c.
Current circulates T1 - T3 / T2 - Secondly, dynamic loading is considered. The increase
0
T4 in load demands higher currents and results in decreased dc
link voltage and hence the load voltage as depicted in Fig. 6.
-Vdc /2 C1+ - T3 - Load - T6 - T5 -C1- The variation of 18% in load at t=0.7 sec, resulted in 16.6%
-Vdc C1+ - T3,- Load- T4 – C2 - C2- increase in current and 3.7% reduction in dc link and load
voltage and is depicted in Fig.6 and can be observed that
before and after load change, the panels deliver equal
amount of power to the load verifying the inherent
capability of power sharing.

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 (a)

(a)

(b)

(b)

(c)
Fig.6. (a) Voltage, current and power of panel 1 (b) Voltage, current and
power of panel 2 (c) DC link voltage, load voltage and load current

Various methods have been presented in the literature for

(c) suppressing the leakage currents below VDE 0126–1–
Fig.5. (a) Voltage, current and power of panel 1 (b) Voltage, current and 1German standards (300mA) [15]. The advantage of the
power of panel 2 (c) DC link voltage, load voltage and load current proposed structure is that the leakage currents are below
300mA and the modulation scheme has reduced it further as
depicted in Fig.7a. the common mode voltage of the inverter
is depicted in Fig.7b.

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 structure can be extended to multiple inputs and proper
selection of switching strategy aids in extracting maximum
power under all operating scenarios.
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