A hybrid DC-DC modular multilevel converter with capacitors parallel connectivity for arm energy balancing

The integration of renewable energy sources in Medium-/High-voltage DC grids has called up continuous research to develop DC-DC conversion systems. This paper presents a hybrid modular multilevel DC-DC converter topology which successfully overcomes the issue of capacitors voltage imbalance during DC-DC conversion. In the proposed topology, single MMC leg is employed with half-bridge submodules in the upper arm and full-bridge submodules in the lower arm along with soft-switched high-voltage valves. The proposed hybrid modular multilevel converter has inherited arm energy equalization with the help of the parallel connectivity of involved arms' capacitors. During the equalization period, the series-connected upper arm capacitors are connected in parallel to the series-connected lower arm capacitors to transfer the energy between the involved arms which results in operating with balanced capacitors voltages. The proposed modular DC-DC converter is a bidirectional converter which allows power flow from high-voltage side to low-voltage side and vice versa, i.e., it can be operated successfully as a DC transformer. The operational concept of the proposed configuration, control strategy, and parameters design are presented. Simulation results are presented along with experimental results of a scaled-down prototype to validate the proposed approach. Simulation and experimental results show the viability of the suggested approach.