Thesis (PhD (Electrical and Electronic Engineering))--University of Stellenbosch, 2011. / AFRIKAANSE OPSOMMING: Hierdie proefskrif handel oor die natuurlike balanserings meganismes van veelvlakkige en modulêre omsetters wat fase-skuif dragolf puls wydte modulasie gebruik. Die meganismes kan in twee hoof groepe verdeel word: ‘n swak balanserings meganisme wat afhanklik is van die oorvleuling van die skakelfunksies en ‘n sterk meganisme wat voorkom ongeag of die skakelfunksies oorvleul al dan nie. Die sterk meganisme verdeel verder in twee subgroepe, ‘n direkte oordrag van onbalans energie en ‘n meganisme wat afhang van die verliese in die stelsel. Elkeen van die meganismes word aan die hand van ‘n omsetter topologie waarin die spesifieke meganisme oorheers beskryf en ontleed. In die ondersoek word klem geplaas op die daarstelling van uitdrukkings om die tydskonstantes van herbalansering na ’n afwyking vir elk van die omsetter toplologieë te beskryf. / ENGLISH ABSTRACT: This thesis investigates the natural balancing mechanisms in multilevel and modular converters using phase shifted carrier pulse width modulation. Two groups of mechanisms are identified; a weak balancing mechanism that is only present when the switching functions are interleaved and a strong mechanism that occurs irrespective of the interleaving of the switching functions. It is further shown that the strong balancing mechanism can be divided into a balancing mechanism that depends on the direct exchange of unbalance energy and a loss based balancing mechanism. Each of the mechanisms is discussed and analysed using a converter where the specific mechanism dominates as example. Emphasis is placed on the calculation of the rebalancing time constant following a perturbation. Closed form expressions for the rebalancing time constants for each of the analysed converters are presented.

Orientador: Carlos Alberto Canesin / Resumo: No presente trabalho de dissertação, é analisado e desenvolvido um conversor ressonante com o objetivo de produzir ozônio, aplicado à água de processos de higienização industrial. Na atualidade, no ano de 2018, dois dos fatores de grande importância no desenvolvimento de conversores para geração de ozônio são: a eficiência energética, isto é, quanta energia é aproveitada em relação à energia total fornecida ao conversor, e a outra é a produção de ozônio fazendo uso dessa energia aproveitada. Os dois fatores não necessariamente estão relacionados, por exemplo, para dois conversores distintos com a mesma energia disponível, pode acontecer que em um deles possa ser produzido maiores concentrações de ozônio com um menor aproveitamento de energia. Portanto, este trabalho enfatiza a melhoria da eficiência energética na produção de ozônio, empregando comutação suave nas estruturas envolvidas do conversor ressonante proposto, o que resulta em uma eficiência energética de 91,57%. A estrutura do conversor proposto apresenta dois estágios em cascata, o primeiro deles, um conversor que é responsável por gerar um barramento CC estável de 400,5 V e que atende aos requisitos de fator de potência e distorção harmônica total com valores de 0,994 e 5,79%(para a corrente de entrada), respectivamente, e o segundo, um inversor ressonante capaz de fornecer uma tensão de 4,4 kV com uma frequência de 10 kHz que atua como fonte de alimentação de um reator conformado por câmaras de descarga usadas em ... (Resumo completo, clicar acesso eletrônico abaixo) / Abstract: In the present dissertation, it is studied and developed a resonant converter in order to produce ozone, applied in water treatment for cleaning processes. Currently, in the year 2018, two of the factors of great importance in the development of converters for ozone generation are: energy efficiency, that is, how much energy is used in relation to the total energy supplied to the converter, and the other is the production of ozone making use of this energy harnessed. The two factors are not necessarily related, for example, for two different converters with the same energy available, it can happen that in one of them can be produced higher concentrations of ozone with a lower use of energy. Therefore, this work emphasizes the improvement of energy efficiency in the production of ozone using soft switching in the involved structures of the proposed resonant converter, which results in an energy efficiency of 91.57%. The structure of the proposed converter has two stages in cascade, the first one, a converter that is responsible for generating a stable DC bus of 400.5 V and that meets the requirements of power factor and total harmonic distortion with values of 0.994 and 5.79% (for the input current), respectively, and the second, a resonant inverter capable of providing a voltage of 4.4 kV with a frequency of 10 kHz which acts as a power supply for a reactor formed by discharge chambers used in ozone generation applications by electric discharge. Naturally, relevant ozone info... (Complete abstract click electronic access below) / Mestre

Indiana University-Purdue University Indianapolis (IUPUI) / This research proposes state-of-the-art multilevel converter topologies and their modulation strategies, the implementation of a conventional flying-capacitor converter topology up to four-level, and a new four-level flying-capacitor H-Bridge converter confi guration. The three phase version of this proposed four-level flying-capacitor H-Bridge converter is given as well in this study. The highlighted advantages of the proposed converter are as following: (1) the same blocking voltage for all switches employed in the con figuration, (2) no capacitor midpoint connection is needed, (3) reduced number of passive elements as compared to the conventional solution, (4) reduced total dc source value by comparison with the conventional topology. The proposed four-level capacitor-clamped H-Bridge converter can be utilized as a multilevel inverter application in an electri fied railway system, or in hybrid electric vehicles. In addition to the implementation of the proposed topology in this research, its experimental setup has been designed to validate the simulation results of the given converter topologies.