An universal active power line conditioner

The power circuit of a general active power line conditioner (APLC) is based on series and shunt power converters that share a single DC link. In the present paper, a generic control concept for these series and shunt converters is proposed. It is based on the instantaneous real and imaginary power theory. In fact, the resulting equipment deals with the custom power and FACTS concepts. This equipment incorporates not only the compensation functions at the fundamental frequency like a unified power flow controller (UPFC), but also provides active harmonic mitigation capabilities. For these reasons, the compensator proposed here is called the universal active power line conditioner (UPLC). Simulation and experimental results are presented to confirm that the new approach has better performance than those obtained by controllers based on traditional concepts of active and reactive power.