An optimal controller for voltage balance and power losses reduction in MPC AC/DC/AC converters

DC-link capacitor voltages in multi-point-clamped (MPC) power converters must be actively controlled in order to achieve a correct voltage sharing. This work presents, in detail, a control strategy, which has been developed according to an energy criterion, that balances the capacitor voltages using only the redundant switching configurations in the synthesis of the line-to-line voltages, while minimizing the additional switching losses.