An Advanced Control Approach for a Shunt Active Power Filter.

M.C. Ben habib, E. Jacquot, S. Saadate

Groupe de Recherche en Electrotechnique et Electronique de Nancy (GREEN), CNRS UMR 7037
B.P. 239, 54506 Vandoeuvre ls Nancy, cedex - France.
Tel: ++33.3.83.68.41.31 Fax: ++33.3.83.68.41.33 Email: Mc.Benhabib@green.uhp-nancy.fr

Abstract.

This paper deals with the design, analysis and

simulation of a three phase three wire shunt active power filter.
It compensates harmonic currents, and reactive power under
balanced and unbalanced supply network. An advanced control
theory based on a self tuning filter is adopted. The novelty with
the control approach developed in this paper is to use a self
tuning filter, which can extract directly the fundamental
currents in the axis with high performance. It will be proved
that the new approach has a good dynamic and without any
delay. Moreover, we are going to propose a PLL with a high
performances when the voltages of the main are strongly
unbalanced and contain harmonics. The simulation results will
illustrate the good performance of this new approach, specially
a better dynamic characteristics in comparison with classical
extraction methods will be obtained. Finally an experimental
branch for testing practically this new control approach is
undergoing now and hopefully the experimental results will be
presented during the conference.

2. System Configuration
The system configuration of the APF connected to the
electrical network by a L-type filter is shown in Fig.1. It
gives the proposed system which is composed of a three
phase source, a rectifier as a non-linear load and an APF
connected in parallel with the electrical network.
rsls

V s 1, 2, 3

However, the performance of the APF is determined by

the kind of control used. It is more emphasised when the
voltages of electrical network contain harmonics and/or
are unbalanced, because many parts of the control of
APF, such as the PLL, filter are very sensitive to the
variation of the electric network voltage.
The authors in this paper propose an advanced control
approach for shunt APF for harmonic current detection.
This advanced control is characterised by a new PLL
which is not sensitive to the disturbances, specifically to
the harmonic and unbalanced voltage. Moreover, we
propose a self tuning filter for extracting harmonic
currents.

r cl c

i sh
Cdc
r fl f

Active power filter, self tuning filter, PLL, analogic

circuit, harmonic currents control.

Since its introduction some twenty years ago, the active

power filter APF presents a good solution for
disturbance treatment, particularly for harmonic currents
and/or voltages.

i L (t)

Ld
Rd

Key words

1. Introduction

i s (t)

Fig. 1. Overview of the system

3. Description of the Advanced control

method
The main objective of this advanced control method is to
improve the performances of some specific parts of the
APF based on the use of the instantaneous real and
imaginary power proposed by H. Akagi et al. [1], such as
the PLL, filter which are very sensitive to the
variations of the electric network voltage under
unbalanced or harmonics context. Fig. 2. Shows the basic
scheme of the control of the APF. According to this
Figure, we notice that the advanced control of the APF
has two specificities :
1.

the use of a PLL after voltage treatment by a self

tuning filter to make it insensible to the voltage
harmonics and unbalanced.

2.

The extraction of harmonic currents realised in the

instantaneous power theory by the calculation of the
active and reactive power, is performed directly from
the currents in the - axis by using a self tuning
filter.

Va Vb Vc
Vf

Self tuning filter

abc /

PLL
Vf

i f

i h

if

ih

Self tuning filter

abc /

1
2

ia ib ic

Active
Power

/ abc

[active - reactive power ] /

Reactive
Power

iaref ibref icref

Fig. 2. Control scheme of the shunt active power filter

4. Self tuning filter

The self tuning filter is the most important part of this
advanced control which allows to make insensible the
PLL to the disturbances and filtering correctly the
currents in - axis.
A. Principal
Hong-scok Song [2] had presented in his PhD work how
recovered the equivalent transfer function of the
integration in the synchronous references frame SRF
expressed by the equation:

xy

(t) =

j t

j t

xy

( t ) dt

H (s) [dB ]

f [Hz]

(1)

k1

Fig. 3. Magnitude curve of H(s) as a function of f and k1.

He found in Laplace transformation the following

equation The demonstration is given in the annex of his
thesis :

H(s)=

V xy ( s ) s + j
=
U xy ( s ) s +

k1

With this transfer function, he shows that the output

signal is in phase with the input signal, with an
integration effect of its magnitude. Moreover, if we trace
the bode diagram of this transfer function we will find
similarities with a band pass filter.
Now suppose that we add two new constants k1 and k2 in
the transfer function of the equation (2). Then we have
the following expression:
H(s )=

( s + k1 ) + jc
V xy ( s )
=k2
(
s + k 1 ) + c
U xy ( s )

H (s)

(2)

(3)

f [Hz]

Fig. 4. Phase angle curve of H(s) as a function of f and k1.

The Fig. 3. And Fig. 4. show us that:

At 50Hz, the phase angle of bode diagram is null,

which means that the two input and output signals
are in phase either k1.

to obtain

H ( s ) = 0 dB it is necessary to make

k2=k1.
So, the transfer function of the equation (3) becomes:

Let fix k2 = 20 and vary k1, the bode diagram in 3D

results in the following figures:

H(s )=

V xy ( s )
( s + k )+ j
=k
( s + k ) +
U xy ( s )

(4)

Fig. 4. gives the circuit scheme of the band pass filter of

equation (4).
-

Vx

Vy

Ux

iL123 [A]

14.7

1
s

1
s

Fig. 6. represents the experimental results, in which : arepresent the load currents, b- the current in axis
before filtering and c- the current in axis after
filtering. We observe that the self tuning filter action is
good in experimentation since it perfectly extracts the
harmonic currents.

Uy

7.35
0
-7.35

Fig. 4. Band pass filter

B. Simulation and experimentation of the band pass filter

The efficiency of filters can
simulations using MATLAB
system blockset. It can
experimentally by a realisation
the band pass self tuning filter.

be tested through the

Simulink and power
also be confirmed
of an analogic circuit of

-14.7
-0.02

-0.01

0.005

0.01

0.015

0.02

t [s]

-a-

i [A]

20

-0.005

10

Fig. 5. represents the simulation result in which

a- represents the load currents, b- the current in - axis
before filtering and c- the current in - axis after
filtering. We observe that the band pass self tuning filter
is performing well and perfectly extracts harmonic
currents.
iL123 [A]

-10

-20
-0.02

-0.015

-0.01

-0.005

0.005

0.01

0.015

0.02

t [s]

-b-

Is123 [A]
20

14.7

10

7.35

0
-10

-20

-7. 35

-0.02

-14.7
0.2

0.205

0.21

0.215

0.22

0.225

0.23

0.235

0.24

t [s]
20

-0.015

-0.015

-0.01

-0.005

0.005

-cFig.6. Experimental results

0.01

0.015

0.02

t [s]

-a-

i [A]

C. Analysis of the simulation and experimental results

10

-10

-20
0.2

20

0.205

0.21

0.215

0.22

0.225

0.23

0.24

t [s]

-b-

Is123 [A]

0.235

However it is shown that the filter is efficient for the

harmonics, but the question is how will be its
performances in the unbalanced case?

10
0
-10
-20
0.2

We notice, from Fig. 5 and Fig. 6, that by simulation and

by experimentation, the proposed filter acts efficiently
and gives good results with no delay at the network
frequency ( f= 50 Hz ) . Besides, for two different input
signals with different harmonic content, the same quality
of filtering is obtained. Moreover we do not find any
difference between simulation and practical result.

0.21

0.22

-cFig.5. Simulation results

0.23

t [s]

0.24

when the voltages of the three phases are unbalanced, it

will be met in axis. We notice, by simulation, that in
spite of an excessive unbalance between the two input
signals, the filter, will generate always two equal
magnitude sine-waves, while making the following
operation:

V x + V y
2

(5)

Fig. 7. Shows that the relative error of the magnitude that

can generate the two output signals for different values of
k when we have an important unbalance, to obtain an
identical magnitude of the two output signals.

[%]
X

Fig. 8. Shows the principle scheme of the PLL.

Vs1 ()
Vs1 ())
Vs3 ()

Vf ()

V()
3/

V()

Vf ()

Vsd

=0

1
s

PI

Filter

Sin
Cos

14
13
12
11
10
9
8
7
6
5
4
3
2
1
0

PLL

Fig. 8. The PLL scheme circuit.

30

40

50

60

70

80

90

100 110 120 130 140 150 160

Fig. 7. Relative error of magnitude as a function of k

The following figure will show the effectiveness and the

robustness of the PLL under high unbalanced voltages
with harmonics.
V [V]

With
being the relative values of magnitude error of
Ux (t) x as a function of k in relation to Vx (t) /
2.
being the relative values of magnitude error of
Uy (t) x as a function of k in relation to Vy (t) / 2.
-a-

We remark from Fig. 7, that when 40 < k < 60 then the

error between the two output signals is small.

t [s]

V f [V]

We can then say that:

1 - when the voltage is disturbed " harmonic and/or
unbalanced " the filter will block it, which will permit the
PLL to work correctly either the voltage network, it will
always be sinusoidal and balanced.
2 In which concerns the load currents, we showed that
the band pass self tuning filter proposed here gives a
good "sinusoidal waveform". So, the difference between
the output and the input signal is the harmonic currents
that the APF must inject in order to compensate harmonic
currents of the electrical network.

-b-

t [s]

V f_ PLL [V]

5. The PLL
In general concerning the PLL, the objective is to
immunise it against the disturbances, more especially
against the harmonic and the unbalances.

t [s]

For this, the advanced and robust regulators such as RST

are used [3], [4], [5].

-cFig. 9. Simulation results of PLL

In this part of the paper, we will show that the best way
to immunise the PLL against the perturbation is to treat
them before they arrive to the PLL. To show the
efficiency of this strategy, we chose to use the self tuning
filter described above, because this type of filter gives a
sinusoidal, balanced and without phase output signal.

With a -Valpha and Vbeta represent the voltage of the

network, b - Valpha and Vbeta voltage of the network after
filtering, and c - The synthetic sine and cosine generated
by the PLL.

We remark that the self tuning filter treats the harmonics

and unbalanced voltage perfectly, and that the PLL
detects the phase angle of the output signal of the filter,
also improve its dynamic with a simple regulator PI,
which gives at the output of the PLL a sinusoidal,
balanced, without delay and with a good dynamic signal.

4. Simulation result of the control of APF

The last simulation, shows the effectiveness of the
control of the active power filter ( Fig. 2 ). By use of this
advanced PLL and the new self tuning the extraction of
the fundamental current is realised when the voltages are
unbalanced.
iL [A]

6. Conclusion
The advanced control strategy method of the APF has
been presented and applied to a three phase balanced or
unbalanced power network with sinusoidal or non
sinusoidal voltages. The satisfactory results have been
obtained. This method takes into account voltage
perturbation of harmonics and unbalanced introduced in
the power supply network. It guaranties then a stable and
sinusoidal load current .

References
[1] H. Akagi, Y. Kanazawa and A. Nabae Generalized
theory of the instantaneous reactive power in three-phase
circuits , Proceeding International power electronics
conference. Tokyo, Japan, PP. 1375-1386, 1983.
[2] Hong-Scok Song Control scheme for PWM
converter and phase angle estimation algorithm under
voltage unbalanced and/or sag condition , Ph.D in
electronic and electrical engineering, POSTECCH
university, Republic of KOREA (South), 2001.

=30

=0

t [s]

Fig. 10. Load current before filtering

ish [A]
30

20

[3] M. A. E. Alali Contribution ltude des

compensateurs actifs des rseaux lectrique basse
tension docteur de luniversit Louis pasteur
Strasbourg1, 2002.
[4] N. Bruyant Etude et commande gnralises
filtres actifs parallles : compensation globale
slective des harmoniques rgime quilibr
dsquilibr Thse de doctorat de luniversit
Nantes, Saint-Nazaire, 25 Novembre 1998.

10

-10

de
ou
ou
de

-20

-30

0.02

0.04

0.06

0.08

0.1

0.12

0.14

0.16

0.18

=30

=0

0.2

t [s]

Fig. 11. Harmonic currents injected by the active power filter

is [A]
30

20

10

-10

-20

-30

0.02

0.04

0.06

0.08

=0

0.1

0.12

0.14

0.16

0.18

=30

0.2

t [s]

Fig. 7. Supply current after filtering

The THD before filtering for the first line is 28.35 % and
becomes 4.93% after filtering.

[5] S-H. Shahalami Filtrage hybride des perturbations

harmoniques produites par des systmes dentranement
asynchrone vitesse variable Thse de doctorat de
luniversit Henri Poincarr, Nancy1, 2001.