Power Electronics Converters Processing AC Voltage and Power Blocks Geometry

This chapter provides a brief review of the main power electronics converters that process ac voltage and an introduction to power blocks geometry (PBG). It introduces the concept of PBG with the concepts, axioms, and postulates defining a systematic way to present power electronics converters. The chapter describes each power block (PB) used in the PBG. It discusses the application of the PBG for multilevel and back-to-back configurations, respectively. Multilevel converters were first conceived for high voltage and high power applications, beginning with the neutral-point-clamped (NPC) inverter. Another important class of configuration that processes ac voltage is the one with two conversion stages, that is, with both rectification (ac-dc conversion) and inversion (dc-ac conversion) stages connected through a dc-link capacitor link. Such topologies are normally called ac-dc-ac configurations (or back-to-back configurations) and are usually described as three-phase to three-phase (3ph-3ph), single-phase to single-phase (1ph-1ph), and single-phase to three-phase (1ph-3ph) conversions.