Twelve pulse LCC based grid tied solar PV system for improved power quality and harmonic mitigation

An increasing number of distributed generations being connected to the utility grid has raised the need for new and more rigorous standards for power quality, safety operation and islanding protection of the grid interconnection. The line commutated converter (LCC) is most matured technology which is used for high power conversion. This paper investigates the feasibility of the proposed 12 pulse line commutated converter (12p-LCC) for the grid integration of solar PV system. A 12p-LCC is capable of suppressing all harmonics below 11th order which improves power quality at grid. The 12p-LCC has inherent anti-islanding feature since islanded operation will not occur as the converter needs the commutating voltage of grid to operate. In addition, this topology maintains the synchronism between converter and ac grid without need of any synchronizing circuit. The simulation is carried out in Matlab/Simulink environment which demonstrate the feasibility of the proposed solution.