Publication Details

High step-up ratio dc-dc converters with megawatt ratings are of interest in wind turbine interfaces and HVDC systems. This paper presents a modular multilevel dc-dc converter based on the standard boost converter topology but with the normal single switches replaced by a number of capacitor clamped sub-modules. The converter is operated in resonant mode with resonance between sub-module capacitors and the arm inductor. A phase-shifted switching arrangement is applied such that there is a constant number, N of sub-modules supporting the high voltage at a time.In this operation mode, the step-up ratio is dependent on the number of sub-modules and the inductor charging ratio. The converter exhibits scalability without using transformer and is capable of bidirectional power flow. An application example of a wind turbine interface with a 10 : 1 conversion ratio is demonstrated in simulation. The experimental verification of the concept using a lab-scale prototype is provided