3D-SVPWM Vector Control of a VSC-HVDC

Transmission System
Daniel Prez Dorantes.
Instituto de Investigaciones Elctricas
Monterrey Nuevo Leon, Mxico

Abstract-In the present paper, the 3D-SVPWM and vector

control techniques are used for the active and reactive power
control of a VSC-HVDC system stations. The control system
is implemented in MATLAB / SIMULINK , where the VSCHVDC system is analyzed on the occurrence of a three-phase
fault in the AC link of an inverter station.
KeywordsVSC-HVDC,
PWM Method.

I.

3D-SVPWM,

Space-Vector

INTRODUCTION

s HVDC systems have been playing a greater role in

electric power transmission systems, they have evolved
their operation speed, control capacity, greater power
handling, and increased efficiency. This is the case of the
VSC-HVDC systems, which became technologically feasible
with the advent of devices such as IGBT and GTO. With the
availability of power semiconductor devices that possess a fast
switching speed, the harmonic content of output voltage is
minimized; besides, a control independent of the active and
reactive power can be achieved within the HVDC systems.
Since the 1950s, power electronic-based technology has been
incorporated into the electrical networks. In HVDC systems,
the first devices to be used as valves were the thyristors, SCR.
Nowadays, the modern VSC-HVDC systems employ devices
such as IGBTs and GTOs and voltage supply converters
(VSCs) are used in place of current supply converters (CSC).
Since its first implementation in 1997, VSC-HVDC systems
have been used in different power systems around the world,
in countries such as Sweden, Norway, Denmark, Australia,
USA, India and China.

The VSC-HVDC systems technology is based on forced

commutated converters using semiconductor devices of high
switching frequency, such as the IGBT, which allow PWM
modulation techniques to generate fast speed changes in the

Jos Luis Monroy Morales

Mximo Hernndez ngeles
Instituto Tecnolgico de Morelia
Divisin de estudios de Postgrado
Morelia Michoacn, Mxico
jlmonroy_m@hotmail.com
AC output voltages of the VSC stations. With PWM, it is
possible to produce a voltage converter output, of any desired
phase angle and amplitude.
HVDC links, used nowadays, employ either VSC or CSC
technology according to the technical requirements of the
electrical network where they are to be installed. HVDC links
are classified according to the type of converter employed;
such converter can be either CSC or VSC. CSC technology is
based on SCR power thyristors, whereas VSC technology
stems from forced commutated switching devices (GTO or
IGBT). In the VSC-HVDC transmission system, the main
control resides in the efficient power transfer between its
terminals. The aim is to have an efficient control of the flow of
active and reactive power, by independently handling the
control loops of both powers. In the literature on the subject
[1], there exist different control strategies for VSC-HVDC
systems. Some of these methods are based on Direct Power
Control (DPC) by controlling both active and reactive power
in closed loop [2]. In the DPC there are no internal control
loops for current, neither are there PWM modulation blocks,
because converters switching are selected from a table of
values. DPC method presents instantaneous errors between the
measured and calculated values of active and reactive power.
This method is used to estimate a virtual vector for the flow in
a closed loop control. Because of the disadvantages in the
variable switching frequency and the need for a rapid
conversion in the data processing, the use of this type of
control is not common in VSC-HVDC systems.
The vector control transforms a three-phase system into a twodimensional space. This method is also used to control threephase PWM converters. In the control of PWM converters,
vector control can be used to independently control the active
and reactive power. The control of the reactive power can be
performed separately in each converter by modifying the AC
voltage phase without changing the DC voltage. Active power

is controlled by either adjusting the DC voltage or varying the

frequency of AC voltage. One advantage in the use of control
vector is that the vector of currents and AC voltages are
generated as steady state vectors, and therefore, static errors in
the control system can be regulated by using PI controllers [3].

II.

VECTOR CONTROL OF VSC-HVDC SYSTEMS

VSC-HVDC systems can be represented considering that the

terminals of the voltage supply are connected to the AC
transmission network via filters and reactors, as shown in Fig.
1 [4]. IC is the output current of the VSC converter, and V is
the voltage in the reactor. The behavior of a voltage-fed
inverter is similar to that of a synchronous generator, where
the fundamental component output voltage can be determined
by:
(

VSC-HVDC systems have a better capacity of controlling the

several electrical parameters involved in HVDC systems, such
as AC and DC voltage, active and reactive power, and the
frequency at the AC side. All these variables are set by
specific function controllers. These variables are compared to
reference values of the external controller to get the reference
voltage of the internal power controller, which receives
feedback from the current id to generate active power, Fig. 2.
Similar steps are taken to handle iq current to control reactive
power. However, the control of the different parameters
cannot be performed simultaneously, since a control type can
be used separately for each converter, depending on the power
system needs. A detailed study is usually required to settle for
a control type.

(1)

Where
is the modulation index, is the fundamental
frequency, and is the phase shift in the output voltage of the
converter

IC

PQ

Reactor

AC

Fig.2. Control Scheme in a terminal VSC-HVDC system.

VDC
V

VC

Filtro de
AC

VF

III.

MATHEMATICAL MODEL FOR VECTOR

CONTROL

Fig. 1. Simplified diagram of a VSC-HVDC system.

Taking the voltage at the filters,

, as reference, the
transferred power from the converter to the AC system can be
written as:
(2)
(

(3)

With 3D-SVPWM modulation technique,

and can be
independently adjusted by the VSC controller. Thus, voltage
magnitude and phase shift can be controlled. Therefore, it is
possible to control the voltage drop across the reactor and the
flow of active and reactive power of the system. Active power
can be controlled by changing the AC voltage converter phase
angle, with respect to the bus voltage, whereas the reactive
power can be controlled by changing the magnitude of the
fundamental component of the AC voltage converter, with
respect to the bus voltage. Considering these two aspects, the
converter can operate in all four quadrants of the P-Q
characteristic [5].

For the analysis of voltage source converters, using vector

control, the three-phase voltages and currents are represented
by two vectors, one for voltage and the other for current.
These vectors are transformed into a complex reference frame,
; then, this reference frame is transformed into a rotating
reference frame, synchronized with the AC network, as shown
in Fig. 3.

q
i
i

d
V=Vd

V
iq

id

Fig. 3. Axes transformation prior to performing vector control.

The dq frame is synchronized with the network, the voltage

and current vectors are of constant magnitude in the dq
reference frame, as described below [6].

Thus, voltaje equations in the reference frame dq are

:
(8)
(9)

For a three-phase abc system, with 120 of phase shift as

shown in Fig. 4, the output voltages are:
Converter output current is:

)]

(10)

The transformation of abc variables into the stationary

reference frame is given by the Clark transformation:

The relationship between AC input power and DC output

power is:
(
)
(11)
Where Vdc and Idc are the VSC output voltage and current,
respectively.

)
)

The transformation of into the reference frame dq is

defined by the -dq transformation:

The voltage vector of the network is defined on the d-axis,

since the voltage on the q-axis is equal to zero, vq = 0. Thus,
the active and reactive power injected into or absorbed from
the AC system are determined by [8]:
(12)
(13)

) [

* +

(5)

Considering the system converter is connected to the network,

as shown in Fig. 4, where voltages and currents are vabc and
iabc, respectively, the converter output voltages are defined as
and the supply resistance and inductance are R and L
respectively. Hence the network voltage can be expressed in
the form:
(6)

Therefore, the transformation into the rotating reference frame

dq coordinate system, oriented with respect to the voltage
vector of the network, leads to a partition of the network
current into two parts. One part determines the contribution
which produces the required flow for feeding the DC bus,
while the other defines the condition of reactive power,
equations (12) and (13). These equations shown the possibility
to control both active and reactive power independently.
The angle between the -axis and the d-axis, in the reference
frame dq is used for the transformation between the reference
frames and dq. The voltage vector is located at the angle:
( )

Where
and
are voltage components of the -axes of the
stationary reference frame. The phase angle and network
voltage are necessary for the independent control of active and
reactive power. The angle is processed in order to
synchronize the controller with the network. Synchronization
is performed by the Phase Locked Loop (PLL). PLL
information is used to synchronize the switching of the power
devices and to control active and reactive power flow.

Fig. 4. VSC Converter connected to AC system.

Utilizing abc to dq transformation, the voltages and currents in

the three-phase converter can be expressed within a dq
reference frame, rotaiting at a speed , as follows:
|

| |

| |

|| |

14)

(7)

Because vector control technology offers decoupled control of

active and reactive power, as well as fast dynamics, it is
possible that the system control be performed by algorithms
simultaneously acting in cascade and parallel, performing an
efficient control of the system. Two cascaded PI control loops,
are used in the outer current loop and one in the inner current
loop. AC currents references are calculated by external

controllers. External controllers include: DC voltage, active

power, reactive power and AC voltage controllers. The
reference value for the id can be provided by the DC voltage or
the active power controllers, while the reference value for the
iq is provided by the AC voltage or reactive power controllers.
The DC voltage controller let to achieve a balance of active
power in the system.
IV.

[ ]

(16)

(17)

3D-SVPWM MODULATION TECHNIQUE

3D-SVPWM algorithm enables to efficiently calculate the

commutation sequence, through four state vectors, which are
adjacent to the reference vector, also to determine the
respective commutation times of the power electronic devices
of the three-level converter. This algorithm utilizes no
trigonometric or look up tables, facilitating its digital
implementation [7]. Fig. 5 show the vector distribution in a
three-dimensional space.

In the Sequence Block, shown in Figure 6, the time instants of

the commutation cycle are calculated.

V.

3D-SVPWM CONTROL OF A VSC-HVDC

TRANSMISSION SYSTEM.

Both station in the transmission system, rectifier and inverter,

are independently controlled, and have two degrees of
freedom, as well as two operation modes. They can operate by
controlling either the flow of both active and reactive power,
at the same time or the flow of both reactive power and DC
voltage. In order for the performance of the HVDC system to
be adequate, in the rectifier station, both active and reactive
power must be controlled, whereas in the inverter station, both
reactive power and DC voltage must be controlled.

Fig. 5. State vectors in a three-dimensional space.

In the present work, the algorithm of the three-dimensional

vector is performed through structured programming as well
as block programming in Simulink, Fig. 6 shows the complete
block diagram of the algorithm [7].
Fig. 7. VSC-HVDC transmission system with vector control.

Fig. 1. Block diagram of the 3D-SVPWM algorithm.

At Vref block the sinusoidal three-phase reference signal is

obtained, this signal possesses an amplitud equal to that of the
voltage from phase to neutral at the output of the inverter. In
Normalization block, a normalization constatnt is determined
for voltage vector abc, utilizing the following equation:
(15)
Where n is the levels number of the converter. The normalized
vector is the input of the modulation algorithm, the SV3D
block. Within such block, the matrix with four commutation
vectors and the corresponding commutation times are defined
by:

In this work a bipolar VSC-HVDC system, shown in Fig. 7, is

analyzed. It connects two 230kV, 60Hz AC systems through
two 571 km DC lines [8]. The nominal DC transmission
voltage and power are 125kV and 200MW respectively. A
230kV/88kV deltawye transformer is used for each VSC
station. Figure 8 shows the block diagram of the vector control
for the VSC-HVDC system, which is implemented in
Matlab/Simulink.

0.04
Qmeas
Qref

0.02

Reactive Power (pu)

0
-0.02
-0.04
-0.06
-0.08
-0.1
-0.12
-0.14
1.3

1.4

1.5

1.6

1.7
1.8
Time(sec)

1.9

2.1

2.2

Fig. 10. Reactive power control in a rectifier station.

1.01
Vdcmeas
Vdcref

Fig. 8. Schematic of the vector control in a VSC station.

RESULTS

Fig. 9 shows the behavior of the active power, by applying a

10% step change in the reference, at time t = 1.5s. Figure 10
shows a 10% change in the reactive power reference signal, at
time t = 2s. In this case, a little effect on the active power is
detected. It is observed that the control operates quickly and
efficiently, the system transient response is oscillatory damped
and quickly reaches the new steady state, at 0.3s and 0.1s, for
the active and reactive power, respectively. Fig. 11 shows the
dynamic response to a 5% amplitude change in the DC
reference voltage, at t = 2.5s. As can be observed, the control
stabilizes the DC voltage at 0.3s, the change of DC voltage
magnitude directly affects the magnitude of the reactive
power, as shown in Figure 12.
1.04
Pmeas
Pref

1.02

0.98

0.97
0.96

0.95

0.94
0.93
2.1

2.2

2.3

2.4

2.5
2.6
Time(sec)

2.7

2.8

2.9

Fig. 11. DC voltage control in the inverter station.

-0.06
Qmeas
Qref

-0.07
-0.08
-0.09

Reactive Power(pu)

VI.

DC Voltage(pu)

0.99

-0.1
-0.11
-0.12
-0.13

-0.14

Active Power (pu)

0.98

-0.15
0.96

-0.16
2.1

0.94
0.92

2.2

2.3

2.4

2.5
2.6
Time(sec)

2.7

2.8

2.9

Fig. 12 .Reactive power response in the inverter station.

0.9
0.88
0.86
1.3

Va
Vb
Vc

1.5

1.4

1.5

1.6
1.7
Time(sec)

1.8

1.9

Fig. 9. Active power control in a rectifier station.

Ac Voltage(pu)

Figures 13 to 16 show the results of the study of a three-phase

fault in the AC system connected at the inverter station. The
occurrence of the failure takes place at in 2.1s and has a
duration of 0.12s. It is observed that the DC voltage has a
magnitude change of 0.2 pu. It can also be noted that the
control designed for HVDC system stabilizes the DC voltage
in 0.1s. During the fault, phase voltages have a magnitude
equal to zero, currents increase to 2pu; and after fault currents
reach values of 4pu during a semi-cycle.

0.5

-0.5

-1

-1.5
2

2.05

2.1

2.15

2.2

2.25
Time(sec)

2.3

2.35

2.4

2.45

2.5

Fig. 13. Inverter station abc voltages during a three-phase to ground fault.

possible to independently control DC voltage, as well as active

and reactive power.

Ia
Ib
Ic

With the incorporation of the 3D-SVPWM technique, a

harmonic reduction occurred, which allows to use smaller
filters in VSC-HVDC system.

Ac current (pu)

-1

VIII.

-2

-3

[1]

A. Bouafia, F Krim. A fuzzy- Logic Based Controller for Three-Phase

PWM Rectifier with unity Power factor operation. J. Electrical Systems
4-1 (2008):36-50.

[2]

L.A Serpa and J.W. Kolar, S.ponnaluri, P.M. Barbosa. A modified direct
power control strategy allowing the connection of three phase inverter
to the grid through LCL filters. Industry Applications IEEE Transactions
on. 2007.

[3]

Mrs. SonaliDasgupta, GayatriAgnihotri. A control Strategy for a VSC

HVDC System in steady state response. International Conference on
Advances in Computing, Control and Telecommunication Technologies,
IEEE. 2009.

[4]

Wei Yao, Jinyu Wen, Haibo He, and Shijie Cheng. Modeling and
Simulation of VSC-HVDC with Dynamic Phasors.Electric Utility
Deregulation and Restructuring and Power Technologies, 2008. DRPT
2008. Third International Conference on.

[5]

Khatir Mohamed, Zidi Sid Ahmed, Hadjeri Samir, Fellah Mohammed

Karim. Performance Analysis of a Voltage Source Converter, VSC
,based HVDC Transmission System under Faulted Conditions. Journal
of Sciences ISSN 1583-0233. 2009.

[6]

Chandra Bajracharya, Marta Molinas, Jon Are Suul, Tore M Undeland.

Understanding of tuning techniques of converter controllers for VSCHVDC. Nordic Workshop on Power and Industrial Electronics, June 911, 2008.

[7]

L.G Franquelo, M.M Prats. Simple and advanced Three dimensional

Space Vector Modulation Algorithm for Four-Leg Multinivel Converters
Topology. The 30th Annual conference of the IEEE Industrial electronics
Society. 2004.

[8]

Rafael Antonio Pea Suesca, cesar Leonardo Trujillo Rodrguez.

Anlisis y simulacin de VSCs con modulacin PWM para uso en
sistemas HVDC. Revista Cientfica y Tecnolgica de la facultad de
ingeniera, Universidad Distrital Francisco Jos de Caldas. 2007.

-4

-5

2.05

2.1

2.15

2.2

2.25
Time(sec)

2.3

2.35

2.4

2.45

2.5

REFERENCES

Fig. 14. Inverter station abc currents during a three-phase to ground fault.
1.25
Vdcmeas
Vdcref

1.2
1.15

1.05
1
0.95
0.9
0.85
0.8

2.05

2.1

2.15

2.2

2.25
2.3
Time(sec)

2.35

2.4

2.45

2.5

Fig. 15. Inverter station DC voltages during a three-phase to ground fault.

0.2
Qmeas
Qref
0

-0.2

Reactive Power pu)

Ac Voltage(pu)

1.1

-0.4

-0.6

-0.8

-1

IX.
-1.2

2.1

2.2

2.3

2.4
Time(sec)

2.5

2.6

2.7

Fig. 16. Inverter station reactive powers during a three-phase to ground

fault.

VII.

BIOGRAPHIES

2.8

M.C. Daniel Prez Dorantes obtained his Bachelors Degree

at Lazaro Crdenas Institute of Technology and earned a
Master's Degree in Science at the Technological Institute of
Morelia, in 2013.

CONCLUSIONS

The design and implementation of a vector control for VSCHVDC systems is presented. The control is based on the abcdq transformation and 3D-SVPWM technique.
The results show that the VSC-HVDC vector control has a fast
and accurate response to the reference signal changes and AC
systems faults.
The developed VSC-HVDC system control based on vector
control and the 3D-SVPWM technique provides two freedom
degrees in controlling the variables of each station and makes

M. C. Jos Luis Monroy Morales obtained a Bachelors

Degree in Electrical Engineering, in 2001, at the
UMSNH. He earned a Masters Degree in Science at the
Technological Institute of Morelia, in 2005. He currently
studies for a Doctoral Degree, at the same institute.

Dr. Mximo Hernndez ngeles, obtained Bachelors,

Masters and Doctoral Degree in Electrical
Engineering at the ESIME-IPN. He currently works as
a professor at the Technological Institute of Morelia.