Search

Pole-to-pole DC faults on HB-MMC-VSC-HVDC schemes impose significant risk of cascade failure on IGBT/diode pairs. Other novel topologies with fault blocking capability, i.e. AAC converters, and DC circuit breakers are not yetfully matured. Therefore, silicon thyristors are used to bypass the DC faults until AC breakers activate. However, silicon thyristors are also at risk of failure due to the capacitor voltage collapse at high junction temperatures caused due to imbalanced reverse recovery current conduction. Hence, the recovery cycles are included as part of IEC standard 62501 HVDC type-test program. Emergence of commercial Silicon Carbide (SiC) thyristors has the potential to tackle this risk. This paper investigates such opportunities and challenges by accurately modeling the performance of thyristors at fault. It was seen that SiC thyristors with acceptable surge current and reverse blocking capability can eliminate the failure mode of silicon thyristors due to minimal recovery stored charge, resulting in an equal share of reverse voltage on all thyristors.

The operation of a voltage source converter (VSC)-based medium-voltage (MV) direct current (DC) link is described. The use of a DC link in an MV distribution network is presented, considering salient similarities and differences to a high-voltage DC link. A PSCAD/EMTDC model was used to demonstrate the dynamic operation of an MVDC link, under normal and faulted network conditions. The study shows that MVDC can provide flexibility in a distribution network by decoupling real (P) and reactive (Q) power flows through the link, under normal operation. During a fault, however, the current injected from the converter could interfere with the detection and discrimination of AC system faults, in distribution networks with current-based protection scheme.

Soft open point (SOP) is a power electronic device that installed in place of normally open points in distribution networks. This paper investigates the performance of SOP under an unbalanced line to ground (L-G) fault in a medium voltage (MV) distribution network. A method to detect unbalanced grid side AC faults was developed using positive and negative sequence currents injected into the feeder by the SOP. Simulations were carried out on a network model developed in PSCAD/EMTDC. Local measurements at SOP grid connection point were used to define a fault index. Results show that the fault index, based on the values of positive and negative sequence currents, is able to effectively detect the presence of an unbalanced fault in a MV distribution network.

This paper investigates the crosstalk-induced spontaneous switchings as continuous cycles of turn-on and turn-off transients as a key reliability criterion in SiC and GaN cascode power devices. The paper presents a wide range of measurements to describe the severity of unwanted switching cycles in presence of a few diodes with high turn-off dI/dt which results in a negative gate voltage induced by the source inductance. Modelling is performed which confirms the theory described to explain the root cause of the continued oscillatory transients and comparisons are made with standalone SiC power MOSFETs.