An improved method to sub‐module voltage balancing in modular multilevel converters with two voltage sensors

Abstract

SummaryThe modular multilevel converter (MMC) is an innovative structure that has expanded the usage of multilevel converters (MLCs) in the electrical industry. Since the MMC initially required a large number of sensors to manage the capacitor voltages, various studies have been done to reduce their number to improve the converter's reliability and reduce construction costs. In this paper's proposed method, merely two voltage sensors are used to balance the converter's capacitor voltages, and voltages are estimated using the exponentially weighted recursive least square (RLS) method in each sampling time. Also, the estimated voltages are sorted according to the capacitor current sign determined by the voltage sensors, and the current sensors are entirely eliminated. Furthermore, three cases for compensating the capacitor estimated voltages are presented, and the last case proposes the sub‐module force algorithm (SFA) for system protection. The efficacy of the proposed method has been assessed via simulation and experimental implementations.