Partial Power-Hardware-in-the-Loop Test for In-Situ Dynamic and Steady-State Validation of a Single Submodule in a Megawatt-Scale MMC
Journal, IEEE Transactions on Power Electronics
J. Park, D. Kim, S. Lee, J. -J. Jung, S. -K. Sul and S. Cui, “Partial Power-Hardware-in-the-Loop Test for In-Situ Dynamic and Steady-State Validation of a Single Submodule in a Megawatt-Scale MMC,” in IEEE Transactions on Power Electronics, doi: 10.1109/TPEL.2025.3642797.
Author
Jaeyeon Park, Dongjoon Kim, Seungyong Lee, Jae-Jung Jung, Seung-Ki Sul, Shenghui Cui
Abstract
Modular multilevel converter (MMC) has been highlighted as a scalable power converter for high-power applications. As a unit power block, submodule (SM) is a key component to achieve the scalability and reliability of the MMC. Therefore, it is important to test an SM under various operating conditions during the development stage before the final full assembly. To reduce the development cost and time, various methods have been presented to test a single SM without a full MMC assembly. Recently, owing to the advancement of processing power, real time simulators are beginning to be incorporated to test an MMC controller as a controller-hardware-in-the-loop-simulation. This article proposes the realization of a versatile powering test scheme for a single SM combining a real-time simulator, referred to as partial power-hardware-in-the-loop (partial PHIL) test. For demonstration, an industrial SM for a 5MW MMC-based motor drive system is tested using the partial PHIL test with full scale voltage and current levels. Various operating conditions are considered, including initial boosting operation, magnetization of the induction motor at standstill, full-load operation, and a step change in speed reference.