Second‐Harmonic Ripple in Two‐Stage Single‐Phase Photovoltaic Inverters: Analysis and Mitigation

ABSTRACT Two‐stage single‐phase photovoltaic inverters exhibit a second‐harmonic ripple at the dc‐link voltage, which can cause variations in the terminal voltage of the photovoltaic array, reducing the efficiency of the maximum power point tracking (MPPT). Initially, this work investigates the efficiency reduction caused by the second‐harmonic component using analytical models. Besides, this work explores a control technique to reduce the ripple in the terminals of the photovoltaic module based on real‐time normalization of the dc/dc converter control signal. This technique is compared with conventional control and with the addition of second‐harmonic resonant control. The case study is based on a 4.4‐kVA/220‐V photovoltaic inverter with input for two photovoltaic strings. The results indicate that both techniques are capable of performing the attenuation of the voltage ripple at the terminals of the photovoltaic array, resulting in efficiency gains in the order of 0.74% for the strategy based on resonant control and 0.95% for the proposed normalization technique. In addition, C‐HIL and experimental results prove the reduction in voltage ripple with the normalization and resonant control. As an advantage, the normalization technique is simpler than the second one, because it does not require modification of the control structure of the dc/dc converter.