Optimized Modeling and Control Strategy of the Single-Phase Photovoltaic Grid-Connected Cascaded H-bridge Multilevel Inverter

Abstract

This paper presents the modeling and control-loop design method with an inverted decoupling scheme of a single-phase photovoltaic grid-connected five-level cascaded H-bridge multilevel inverter. For the unity power factor, the proportional and integral current controller with a duty ratio feed-forward compensation is used. In addition, in order to achieve the maximum power point tracking of each photovoltaic array, when the stacked modules are in the partial shading condition, each direct current (DC) voltage is stably controlled to their maximum power points (MPP) by dedicated voltage controllers of each H-bridge module. This paper also presents a control method that minimizes the effect of the loop-interaction in the design of an individual DC-link voltage control loop in a two-input two-output system. The proposed control methods of the cascaded H-bridge multilevel inverter are validated through the simulation and experimental results of the 2-kW prototype hardware.