A Real-Time Method for Detecting an Open-Switch Fault in a NPC
Rectifier System, based on Park’s Current
Huanwen Yang, Jin Zhao, Weikang Wang
School of Automation, Huazhong University of Science and Technology, Wuhan 430074, China
E-mail: yanghuanwen93@qq.com
Abstract: This study presents a new real-time method to diagnosis single Insulated Gate Bipolar Transistor(IGBT)
open-circuit(OC) fault in three-level neutral-point clamped(3LNPC) converter. The Park’s current is calculated in the
proposed method to get the q component’s lower envelope and its comparison value. The calculation of the proposed
method is very simple and no additional current and voltage sensors are required. The longest detection time of this
method is about two current cycle, the performance and effectiveness of the method are validated by simulation results.
Key Words: Fault diagnosis, 3LNPC converter, open-circuit fault, fault location, IGBT.
1 INTRODUCTION
In recent years, the multi-level converter has taken more and
more attention due to its large output capacity. The problem
of designing high power voltage source converter has been
solved with the emergence of multilevel topology structure
[1,2]. Three-level converter is one of the most common due
to the fact that it has several advantages compared to the
tradition two-level converter: the pressure level of the
switching device is reduced by half under the same DC bus
voltage, the harmonic content of its output voltage is
reduced by 50% at the same switching frequency, and its
output power is doubled under the same power switch
device [3-5].
3LNPC is also used extensively in the medium-voltage
systems, a summary report of the main characteristics and
effects of 3LNPC is presented in [6-8]. Seven-phase voltage
source inverter [9], wind power systems [10,11],
photovoltaic systems [12] are a part of applications of
3LNPC converter. A lot of damage will be caused if the
3LNPC is failed to work. To increase the stability of the
system, the fault-tolerant control strategy is researched by
many scholars [13,14], fault diagnosis and localization is an
indispensable part of the whole fault tolerant system.
Various fault diagnosis strategies are proposed both towards
two levels and three levels. However, a minor OC fault can
only affect the performance of the system, the whole system
needn’t shut down. In this paper, only the OC fault is
discussed.
The number of switch in three levels is twice the level of two
levels, therefore, the possibility of a switch fault in three
level converter is much higher, and the detection of the fault
is much more difficult because the combinations of each
switch is very complex. The switch fault can be divided into
two types: short-circuit fault and open circuit fault. The
short-circuit fault usually brings a devastating blow to the
This work is supported by National Nature Science Foundation under
Grant 61573159.
system, stop measures are usually adopted to avoid further
damage.
With regard to the diagnosis strategy used, several options
are available for switching device. In general, they can be
classified into two categories: current detection and voltage
detection. Phase voltage is a very common characteristic in
diagnosis strategy, the phase voltage distortion which is
figured out by the reference currents and the measured
currents is utilized in [15] to locate the single switch fault in
two levels, but it would be disturbed easily by unknown
frequency of harmonic. Besides, sectoral averaging
residuals between the estimated voltage and the measured
voltage are good parameters to detect OC fault [16]. A team
of the two methods is putted forward in [17] and [18].
Compared with the current detection, the voltage detection
is faster, but the additional sensors are needed. The method
of calculating residual is also applied equally to three phase
current [19,20]. The current trend analysis, Euclidean
distance, cosine similarity metric trend current can also be
used as characteristic quantity to diagnose multiple
transistor OC fault [21,22].
Voltage detection is also widely applied in 3LNPC
converter because of its less detection time and the complex
topology of 3LNPC converter. Tae-Jin Kim et al. Proposed
a method, based on the inherent characteristic of continuous
PWM, is achieved by measuring the pole voltage and its
duration time [23]. The algorithm in [24] is based on the
instant voltage error in the converter and the signals already
available to the control system is required. The method
based on the valuation of the output pole voltage and output
currents is proposed in [25], the detection is very fast but
additional sensor is needed. The condition that the phase
current is reduced at the fault cycle is utilized in [26,27], the
diagnostic technique is based on the average current Park’s
vector approach. Another method on the basis of the radius
of the Concordia current pattern is also used to detect the
switch fault in [28]. According to the phase current
characteristic at zero field under the fault condition, the fault
switch can also be detected and located by detecting zero