OPTIMIZATION ALGORITHMS FOR HARMONICS MITIGATION IN CASCADED MULTILEVEL CONVERTERS: A REVIEW

Recent advancements in the field of power electronics have made possible the worldwide application of converters in dc power source utilization, uninterruptible power supplies, electric motor speed control, switched mode power supplies, flexible alternating current transmission systems devices including static synchronous compensator and their controls. Power semiconductor devices such as converters have been emerged as powerful devices in the power industries. As such, harmonics free output of inverters is assuming extreme importance. Over the past decades, depending upon the topologies and control strategies, numerous optimization techniques have been proposed for desired output waveform. This paper presents a review of optimization techniques used for multilevel inverters. The pros and cons of optimization techniques are discussed. The objective of these optimization techniques is to find out the optimum firing angles of multilevel inverters, which results in minimum harmonics. As a preferred option for proposed work, reduction of total harmonic distortion with the aid of particle swarm optimization technique to multilevel inverters is suggested.