Five-level one-capacitor boost multilevel inverter

Abstract

Multilevel inverter configurations are a suitable candidate for medium and high power applications. This study presents a new one-capacitor-based five-level (2Vdc, Vdc, 0, -Vdc, - 2Vdc) boost multilevel inverter. The single-phase version of the proposed formation has one dc-source, eight switches and one capacitor. To provide boosting ability, the inverter is operating based on charge-pump theory, where the capacitor is charging in parallel and discharging in series connections to provide a higher output voltage. The proposed configuration requires simple control tasks, and for this purpose, level-shift pulse width modulation strategy, where the reference signal is compared with four carriers, is implemented to drive the switches and generates the required pulses pattern. The developed inverter has some distinct features like the usage of only one dc-source and one-capacitor, compact size, simple control requirements and boosting ability. The system is simulated with MATLAB/Simulink and a hardware prototype is developed to verify the performance of the developed five-level configuration. The results show that the developed five-level multilevel inverter reaches the expected performance.