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CSEE Journal of Power and Energy Systems 2023, 9(4): 1567-1576 https://doi.org/10.17775/CSEEJPES.2021.06420
Regular Paper | Open Access | Issue | Published: 09 December 2022

Analysis of Operational Characteristics and Equivalent Test Method for IGBTs in MMC

Show Author's Information Yixuan Yang1( ),  Guangfu Tang2,  Shan Liu2,  Gaoyong Wang2,  Zhiyuan He2
State Key Laboratory of Alternate Electrical Power System with Renewable Energy Sources, North China Electric Power University, Beijing 102206, China
State Grid Smart Grid Research Institute Co., Ltd., Beijing 102209, China
Keywords:
reliability, IGBT, MMC, Equivalent test
Cite this article:
Yang Y, Tang G, Liu S, et al. Analysis of Operational Characteristics and Equivalent Test Method for IGBTs in MMC. CSEE Journal of Power and Energy Systems, 2023, 9(4): 1567-1576. https://doi.org/10.17775/CSEEJPES.2021.06420
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Abstract Full text About this article

A design methodology and a feasible equivalent circuit are proposed to test the reliability of insulated gate bipolar transistors (IGBT) in actual modular multilevel converter (MMC) conditions, which is impossible for existing IGBT test platforms due to unexplicit equivalent indexes and low reliability of test platforms. Characteristics of IGBT devices are extracted during MMC operation, and turn-off transient and effective current are highlighted as key indexes for the equivalent test. A feasible equivalent timing diagram and a corresponding test circuit are proposed, as well as the circuit’s operation concept. The proposed equivalent test method is verified by a back-to-back experiment with twenty-four submodules, and results indicate the proposed method has good equivalence. Between the proposed circuit waveform and the back-to-back experiment waveform, all indexes have errors of less than 5.9%. Furthermore, the proposed circuit components have losses less than 0.7 times those of the device under test, making them reliable and suitable for long-term operation tests for IGBT devices in MMC.


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About this article

Analysis of Operational Characteristics and Equivalent Test Method for IGBTs in MMC

Show Author's information Yixuan Yang1( ), Guangfu Tang2, Shan Liu2, Gaoyong Wang2, Zhiyuan He2
State Key Laboratory of Alternate Electrical Power System with Renewable Energy Sources, North China Electric Power University, Beijing 102206, China
State Grid Smart Grid Research Institute Co., Ltd., Beijing 102209, China

Abstract

A design methodology and a feasible equivalent circuit are proposed to test the reliability of insulated gate bipolar transistors (IGBT) in actual modular multilevel converter (MMC) conditions, which is impossible for existing IGBT test platforms due to unexplicit equivalent indexes and low reliability of test platforms. Characteristics of IGBT devices are extracted during MMC operation, and turn-off transient and effective current are highlighted as key indexes for the equivalent test. A feasible equivalent timing diagram and a corresponding test circuit are proposed, as well as the circuit’s operation concept. The proposed equivalent test method is verified by a back-to-back experiment with twenty-four submodules, and results indicate the proposed method has good equivalence. Between the proposed circuit waveform and the back-to-back experiment waveform, all indexes have errors of less than 5.9%. Furthermore, the proposed circuit components have losses less than 0.7 times those of the device under test, making them reliable and suitable for long-term operation tests for IGBT devices in MMC.

Keywords: reliability, IGBT, MMC, Equivalent test

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Received: 31 March 2021
Revised: 26 January 2022
Accepted: 09 March 2022
Published: 09 December 2022
Issue date: July 2023

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