Comparative study on minimization of conduction and switching losses in cascaded multilevel inverter via reduced switches and equal voltage source-sharing

Purpose Multilevel inverters play a major role in the development of high-power industrial applications. In traditional low-level inverters (e.g. 2-level), the switching frequency is restricted and the harmonic spectrum of the system is hard to meet power requirements. Similarly, high-level inverters consist of a large number of switches, complex modulation techniques and complex hardware architecture, which results in high power loss and a significant amount of harmonic distortion. Furthermore, it is a must to ensure that every switch experiences the same stress of voltage and current. The purpose of this paper is to present an inverter topology with lower conduction and switching losses via reduced number of switches and equal voltage source-sharing technique. Design/methodology/approach Herein, the authors present a cascaded multilevel inverter having less power switches, a simple modulation technique and an equal voltage source-sharing phenomenon implementation. Findings The modulation technique becomes more complex when equal voltage source-sharing is to be implemented. In this study, a novel topology for the multilevel inverter with fewer switches, novel modulation technique, equal voltage source-sharing and Inductor-Capacitor-Inductor filter implementation is demonstrated to the reduce harmonic spectrum and power losses of the proposed system. Originality/value The nine-level inverter design is validated using software simulations and hardware prototype testing; the power losses of the proposed inverter design are elaborated and compared with the traditional approach.