Modeling and control of a PEM fuel cell based hybrid multilevel inverter

Multilevel inverter is an effective and practical solution for increasing power demand and reducing harmonics of AC waveforms. It is mainly employed in the distributed energy sources area because several batteries, fuel cell and solar cell can be connected through multilevel inverter to feed a load. This paper investigates the potentials of a single-phase Hybrid Cascaded Multilevel Inverter (HCMLI) fed from Proton Exchange Membrane Fuel Cell (PEMFC). A mathematical model of the PEMFC supplying HCMLI has been developed. This paper also presents the effect of a novel hybrid modulation on the device switching losses and harmonics of HCMLI. The proposed hybrid modulation technique combines the fundamental frequency switching scheme and Variable Frequency Inverted Sine Pulse Width Modulation (VFISPWM) technique. A comparison between the hybrid modulation strategy and the conventional Phase Disposition (PD) PWM method is also presented in terms of THD and switching losses. A suitable PID controller has been designed to control the output voltage of fuel cell based HCMLI, so that it can provide constant AC voltage with minimum THD up to the rated conditions. The inverter circuit topology and its control scheme are described in detail and their performance is verified based on simulation and experimental results.