Soft-Switched Step-Up Medium Voltage Power Converters

With a ten-year average annual growth rate of 19 percent, wind energy has been the largest source of new electricity generation for the past decade. Typically, an offshore wind farm has a medium voltage ac (MVac) grid that collects power from individual wind turbines. Since the output voltage of a wind turbine is too low (i.e., typically 400 690 V) to be connected to the MVac grid (i.e., 20 40 kV), a heavy line-frequency transformer is used to step up the individual turbines output voltage to the MV level. To eliminate the need for bulky MVac transformers, researchers are gravitating towards the idea of replacing the MVac grid with a medium voltage dc (MVdc) grid, so that MV step-up transformers are replaced by MV step-up power electronic converters that operate at the medium frequency range with much lower size and weight. This dissertation proposes a class of modular step-up transformerless MV SiC-based power converters with soft-switching capability for wind energy conversion systems with MVdc grid. This dissertation consists of two parts: the first part focuses on the development of two novel groups of step-up isolated dc-dc MV converters that utilize various step-up resonant circuits and soft-switched high voltage gain rectifier modules. An integrated magnetic design approach is also presented to combine several magnetic components together in the modular high voltage gain rectifiers. The second part of this dissertation focuses on the development of several three-phase ac-dc step-up converters with integrated active power factor correction. In particular, a bridgeless input ac-dc rectifier is also proposed to combine with the devised step-up transformerless dc-dc converters (presented in the first part) to form the three-phase soft-switched ac-dc step-up voltage conversion unit. In each of the presented modular step-up converter configurations, variable frequency control is used to regulate the output dc voltage of each converter module. The operating principles and characteristics of each presented converter are provided in detail. The feasibility and performance of all the power converter concepts presented in this dissertation are verified through simulation results on megawatts (MW) design examples, as well as experimental results on SiC-based laboratory-scale proof-of-concept prototypes

Soft-Switched Step-Up Medium Voltage Power Converters

With a ten-year average annual growth rate of 19 percent, wind energy has been the largest source of new electricity generation for the past decade. Typically, an offshore wind farm has a medium voltage ac (MVac) grid that collects power from individual wind turbines. Since the output voltage of a wind turbine is too low (i.e., typically 400 690 V) to be connected to the MVac grid (i.e., 20 40 kV), a heavy line-frequency transformer is used to step up the individual turbines output voltage to the MV level. To eliminate the need for bulky MVac transformers, researchers are gravitating towards the idea of replacing the MVac grid with a medium voltage dc (MVdc) grid, so that MV step-up transformers are replaced by MV step-up power electronic converters that operate at the medium frequency range with much lower size and weight. This dissertation proposes a class of modular step-up transformerless MV SiC-based power converters with soft-switching capability for wind energy conversion systems with MVdc grid. This dissertation consists of two parts: the first part focuses on the development of two novel groups of step-up isolated dc-dc MV converters that utilize various step-up resonant circuits and soft-switched high voltage gain rectifier modules. An integrated magnetic design approach is also presented to combine several magnetic components together in the modular high voltage gain rectifiers. The second part of this dissertation focuses on the development of several three-phase ac-dc step-up converters with integrated active power factor correction. In particular, a bridgeless input ac-dc rectifier is also proposed to combine with the devised step-up transformerless dc-dc converters (presented in the first part) to form the three-phase soft-switched ac-dc step-up voltage conversion unit. In each of the presented modular step-up converter configurations, variable frequency control is used to regulate the output dc voltage of each converter module. The operating principles and characteristics of each presented converter are provided in detail. The feasibility and performance of all the power converter concepts presented in this dissertation are verified through simulation results on megawatts (MW) design examples, as well as experimental results on SiC-based laboratory-scale proof-of-concept prototypes

Soft-Switched Step-Up Medium Voltage Power Converters

With a ten-year average annual growth rate of 19 percent, wind energy has been the largest source of new electricity generation for the past decade. Typically, an offshore wind farm has a medium voltage ac (MVac) grid that collects power from individual wind turbines. Since the output voltage of a wind turbine is too low (i.e., typically 400 690 V) to be connected to the MVac grid (i.e., 20 40 kV), a heavy line-frequency transformer is used to step up the individual turbines output voltage to the MV level. To eliminate the need for bulky MVac transformers, researchers are gravitating towards the idea of replacing the MVac grid with a medium voltage dc (MVdc) grid, so that MV step-up transformers are replaced by MV step-up power electronic converters that operate at the medium frequency range with much lower size and weight. This dissertation proposes a class of modular step-up transformerless MV SiC-based power converters with soft-switching capability for wind energy conversion systems with MVdc grid. This dissertation consists of two parts: the first part focuses on the development of two novel groups of step-up isolated dc-dc MV converters that utilize various step-up resonant circuits and soft-switched high voltage gain rectifier modules. An integrated magnetic design approach is also presented to combine several magnetic components together in the modular high voltage gain rectifiers. The second part of this dissertation focuses on the development of several three-phase ac-dc step-up converters with integrated active power factor correction. In particular, a bridgeless input ac-dc rectifier is also proposed to combine with the devised step-up transformerless dc-dc converters (presented in the first part) to form the three-phase soft-switched ac-dc step-up voltage conversion unit. In each of the presented modular step-up converter configurations, variable frequency control is used to regulate the output dc voltage of each converter module. The operating principles and characteristics of each presented converter are provided in detail. The feasibility and performance of all the power converter concepts presented in this dissertation are verified through simulation results on megawatts (MW) design examples, as well as experimental results on SiC-based laboratory-scale proof-of-concept prototypes

Tuberculin Skin Test among 1,424 Healthy Employees in Chaharmahal Province, Iran

Background: Tuberculosis is still an important problem in developing countries. The tuberculin skin test (TST) is used for the identification of latent tuberculosis (TB) infection. This study aimed to evaluate the TST results of healthy employees of different departments in chaharmahal province, Iran. Materials and Methods: This study was done on 1,424 healthy employees from 49 different departments in Chaharmahal Province. The tuberculin skin test was done with Purified Protein Derivative (PPD) solution. The induration was evaluated 48- 72 hours later. Results: Negative PPD test was observed in 346 subjects. A 5-10 mm induration was seen in 276, a 10-15 mm in 292, a 15- 20 mm in 212, a 20-25 mm in 72, and a 25-30 mm induration was observed in 14 cases. A total of 212 subjects were absent when reading the induration. Conclusion: Tuberculin skin test can be used for the identification of TB infection. Prevalence of latent TB infection was low in our study. There were no significant differences in PPD test results between medical and non-medical departments

Applying VNPSO Algorithm to Solve the Many-to-Many Hub Location-Routing Problem in a Large scale

One way to increase the companies’ performance and reducing their costs is to concern the transportation industry. Many-to-many hub location-routing problem (MMHLRP) is one of the problems that can affect the process of transportation costs. The problem of MMHLRP is one of the NP-HARD problems. Hence, solving it by exact methods is not affordable; however it was first solved by Benders decomposition algorithm. Modeling and the solving algorithm is able to solve the problem with 100 nodes. In this study, using VNPSO (a combination of the two methods VNS and PSO) was suggested to solve MMHLRP in large-scale. Given high similarity of the results obtained in small scale, using a random sample confirmed that the proposed method was able to solve problem MMHLRP with 300 nodes and acceptable accuracy and speed

A hybrid Tabu search-simulated annealing method to solve quadratic assignment problem

Quadratic assignment problem (QAP) has been considered as one of the most complicated problems. The problem is NP-Hard and the optimal solutions are not available for large-scale problems. This paper presents a hybrid method using tabu search and simulated annealing technique to solve QAP called TABUSA. Using some well-known problems from QAPLIB generated by Burkard et al. (1997) [Burkard, R. E., Karisch, S. E., & Rendl, F. (1997). QAPLIB–a quadratic assignment problem library. Journal of Global Optimization, 10(4), 391-403.], two methods of TABUSA and TS are both coded on MATLAB and they are compared in terms of relative percentage deviation (RPD) for all instances. The performance of the proposed method is examined against Tabu search and the preliminary results indicate that the hybrid method is capable of solving real-world problems, efficiently

GROUND REACTION FORCES ATTENUATION IN SUPINATED AND PRONATED FOOT DURING SINGLE LEG DROP- LANDING

The purpose of this study was to compare the GRF attenuation between normal, supinated and pronated foot during single leg drop-landing. 30 healthy male students from kinesiology department participated in this study. Subjects were assigned to three groups by navicular drop test and performed single leg drop-landing on the force plate from the box with height of 30 Cm. peak VGRF and ROL calculated using GRF data. To evaluate differences in peak VGRF and ROL between three groups MANOVA at the P level of 0.05 used. Differences in ROL was significant between three groups (F2, 22=15.553, Wilks’ Lambda = 0.370, ) but differences in Peak VGRF was not significant (F2, 22 = 2.632,). These results suggest that supinated foot is associated with specific lower extremity kinetics. Differences in these parameters may subsequently lead to differences in injury patterns in supinated foot in athletes