Assisted Power Transfer for Voltage Balance of Bipolar DC MicroGrids Using Inactive Motor Drives

A voltage balancer remains a good solution of power transfer for bipolar dc grids, which, however, would increase the costs due to its requirement for additional hardware support. In this article, an auxiliary power transfer strategy is proposed by using the inactive motor drives affiliated with the bipolar dc grid. During idle periods of the motor drive, one inverter bridge arm is connected with the bipolar dc grid at their neutral points, allowing bidirectional power transfer between the upper and lower dc-bus sources. The proposed strategy share part of the voltage balancer's power transfer burden without requiring additional hardware and affecting the normal operations of the motor drive. In addition, its effectiveness is verified by experimental results on an interior permanent magnet synchronous motor drive, showing that the power flows among the upper and lower dc-bus power supplies are controlled effectively. Also, the active control of the dc-bus voltages could be achieved by modulation of the phase currents.