A Modified Modular Multilevel Converter with Reduced Number of Power Electronic Components

Document Type : Original Article

Authors

1 Department of electrical Engineering electrical Engineering Faculty of engineering Menoufiya University, Egypt

2 Department of electrical Engineering Faculty of engineering Menoufiya University, Egypt

3 Department of electrical Engineering Menoufiya University, Egypt

Abstract

This paper presents a modified multilevel inverter with a few number of semiconductor
switches and increasing number of output levels. One stage of the proposed inverter leads to get
seven levels in the output voltage, while, forty-nine levels can be obtained when using two stages.
Only six semiconductor switches are required for each stage. Standard DC sources are used, so,
DC-DC converter is not required to get the desired output standard voltage. Total harmonic
distortion in the output waveform of the two stage inverter is very low, so, using filter to improve
output waveform is unnecessary. This topology is valid for all types of loads. Simulation results
are presented for one stage and two stage inverters proposed. Experimental results are included for
the one stage inverter to verify the theoretical results.

Keywords