A Novel Fundamental Frequency Switching Operation for Conventional VSI to Enable Single-Stage High-Gain Boost Inversion with ANN Tuned QWS Controller

Single-stage high-gain inverters have recently gained much research focus as interfaces for inherent low voltage DC sources such as fuel cells, storage batteries, and solar panels. Many impedance-assisted inverters with different input stage configurations have been presented. To decrease passive component sizes, these inverters operate at high-frequency switching. The high-frequency switching optimizes the passive component sizes but introduces many challenges in the form of high-frequency inductor design, control complexity, high-frequency gate driver requirements, high semiconductor losses, and electromagnetic interferences. This article proposes a novel fundamental frequency switching operation for the conventional voltage source inverters (VSI) to operate as a single-stage high-gain inverter. As the novel operational strategy changes the behavior of conventional VSI from buck inverter to a boost inverter, it is hereafter termed as a novel inverter. By virtue of the operation strategy, switches withstand peak inverse voltage (PIV) equal to DC link voltage, unlike other impedance assisted boost inverters where PIV across switches is the amplified DC voltage. The proposed inverter can invert low-level DC voltage to high voltage AC with low total harmonic distortion (THD) in a single stage without the help of any external filter. A novel quarter-wave symmetric phase-shift controller is proposed for variable voltage and frequency control of proposed inverters tuned by a back-propagation thin-plate-spline neural network (BPTPSNN). Mathematical analysis with experimental validation is presented. Experimentation is carried out on a prototype of 2 kW for single-phase resistive load, induction motor, and non-linear loads.

Automated summary

Single-stage high-gain inverters have attracted research attention for their ability to convert low voltage DC sources into high voltage AC without the need for external filters. The proposed novel inverter operates at fundamental frequency switching, changing the behavior of conventional VSI and achieving low total harmonic distortion. Experimental validation on a 2 kW prototype shows successful operation for various loads.