Enhancing Power Quality Using Packed U Cell 5 Multilevel Inverter-Based Shunt Active Power Filter with Fuzzy Controller

Shunt Active Power Filters (SAPF) is a prominent solution for improving power quality in power network by mitigating harmonics generated by nonlinear loads. Even though Multilevel Inverter (MLI)-based SAPF produces low distortion waveforms, switching signal generation with more number of driver units makes the compensation unit more complex. Hence, to override this problem, Packed U Cell inverters are emerged. This paper formulated Packed U Cell inverter with five level output (PUC5)-based SAPF for harmonics reduction and power quality enhancement. This formulated SAPF comprises two control loops namely an inner current loop that acts as a source current shaping loop and an outer voltage control loop, which regulates the DC link capacitor voltage. Thus, in this work, Ancillary Proportional Integral Current Controller (APICC) and Fuzzy Logic Controller (FLC) are tailored as a current and voltage controller, respectively. The reference current for the inner current loop of the proposed SAPF is derived from the outer loop. Simulation modeling using MATLAB simulation and experimental setup is realized to verify the efficiency of the proposed system. A comparative analysis is carried out with PI controller to show the betterment of the proposed FLC controller. From the results, it is found that the THD is reduced to 1.79% with the implementation of FLC with SAPF. Hence, it is proven that SAPF with APICC plus FLC controller shows excellent performance in power quality improvement.