Capacitor Voltage Imbalance Reduction in Flying Capacitor Modular Multilevel Converters by using Model Predictive Control

Abstract

Multilevel converters are very interesting for medium and high power applications because of their high efficiency and lower distortion harmonic and many other advantages. This paper investigates the effect of finite control set model predictive control (FCS-MPC) on capacitor voltage balancing and load current ripple in a four level three cell flying capacitor (FC) converter and compared with phase shifted carrier pulse width modulation method (PSC-PWM). The FCS-MPC method is presented as a simple strategy that can control multiple variables. The simulation results are used to propose a comparison between two control methods. The results such as current ripple and voltage balancing are displayed in tables for comparison. In this paper simulation is performed using MATLAB/Simulink software.