Abstract
The power converters are taking responsibility to produce high-quality output voltage and current waveforms from the various PV sources. Recently, PV applications focus on high-frequency ac power distribution (HF-AC-PD). In particular, dc/ac switched capacitor multilevel inverters (SCMLIs) significantly reduce the power conversion stages and components, which result in high conversion efficiency. This article proposes a new SCMLI topology with a reduced number of switches and a self-balanced floating capacitor (FC) voltage. The proposed topology is configured as a single dc source and three dc sources. The proposed topology generates thirteen level output voltage waveforms, and the output voltage (V-o) is two times higher than the input voltage (V-in). The discharging time is less than the recently suggested topologies. Furthermore, the voltage stress on switches is reduced to 50% concerning the load voltage. Thus, a remarkable reduction in the bulky size of the FC is achieved. The simulation results are discussed for different fundamental frequencies of 360 Hz, 400 Hz, and 1 kHz and considering various loads. The proposed converter prototype is designed in the laboratory for 2 kW, and the results are presented. The results show a good agreement in terms of total harmonic distortions, power loss, and efficiency.