A static voltage fluctuation compensator for AC electric railway

This paper reports on the basic configuration of the railway static power conditioner (RPC), a static voltage compensator for AC electric railways. An RPC is comprised of a pair of self-commutated PWM inverters. These inverters connect the main phase and teaser feeding buses, coupled with a DC side capacitor such as a back-to-back (BTB) converter. 20 MVA / 60 kV RPCs started commercial operation in 2002 at each substation on the newly extended Tohoku Shinkansen. The results of operational testing indicate that an RPC can accommodate single-phase loads such as those of PWM-controlled Shinkansen and thyristor phase-controlled Shinkansen, handle the exciting rush current of transformers, as well as compensate for harmonics. The voltage fluctuations on the three-phase side were successfully controlled by the RPCs.