Protection for submodule overvoltage caused by converter valve-side single-phase-to-ground faults in FB-MMC based bipolar HVDC systems

Li, Gen ORCID: https://orcid.org/0000-0002-0649-9493, Liang, Jun ORCID: https://orcid.org/0000-0001-7511-449X, Ugalde-Loo, Carlos E. ORCID: https://orcid.org/0000-0001-6361-4454, Ma, Fan, Liang, Haifeng ORCID: https://orcid.org/0000-0001-7511-449X and Song, Ziming 2020. Protection for submodule overvoltage caused by converter valve-side single-phase-to-ground faults in FB-MMC based bipolar HVDC systems. IEEE Transactions on Power Delivery 35 (6) , pp. 2641-2650. 10.1109/TPWRD.2020.2974413

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Abstract

One of the most critical faults affecting modular multilevel converter (MMC) based bipolar high-voltage direct-current (HVDC) transmission systems is the single-phase-to-ground (SPG) faults between the converter transformer and the valve. However, half-bridge (HB) and full-bridge (FB) based MMCs exhibit a different behavior following such a fault and, thus, converter protection should be addressed in a different manner for each configuration. For HB-MMCs, an SPG fault at the valve-side leads to a severe overvoltage on the submodule (SM) capacitors in the converter upper arms and to grid-side non-zero crossing currents. Although FB-MMCs only exhibit overvoltage, these are more severe than for their HB counterparts. To address this problem, this paper presents a protection strategy considering thyristor bypass branches placed in parallel with upper arms of FB-MMCs. By employing this configuration, the upper arm overvoltage in the faulted converter is mitigated and remote converters can be quickly blocked using their local protection schemes. For completeness, the effectiveness of the strategy is verified through time-domain simulations in PSCAD/ EMTDC. The studies in this paper demonstrate the effectiveness of the presented protection scheme for station internal faults occurring in FB-MMCs in bipolar HVDC systems.

Item Type:	Article
Date Type:	Publication
Status:	Published
Schools:	Engineering
Publisher:	Institute of Electrical and Electronics Engineers (IEEE)
ISSN:	0885-8977
Date of First Compliant Deposit:	13 February 2020
Date of Acceptance:	12 February 2020
Last Modified:	21 Nov 2024 20:00
URI:	https://orca.cardiff.ac.uk/id/eprint/129648

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