HVDC Converter For Railways
HVDC Converter For Railways
I. I NTRODUCTION
A. General Problem and Paper Background
the three main types of electric feeding for railways; DCfeeding, low-frequency AC feeding, and public grid frequency
AC-feeding.
In this paper a feeder concept comprising a multi-terminal
HVDC (MTDC) supply line is investigated. Using HVDC
would lead to less land use for the power lines compared to
the AC transmission lines since they can be designed as cables
and thus placed alongside the railway line. The land use for
HVAC transformer stations and HVDC-to-catenary substations
are on the other hand of comparable size, whereas the material
usage is less for the in this paper suggested HVDC equipment.
B. Present Railway Power Supply System Technologies Problem Background
For thorough descriptions of railway power supply systems
and their dimensioning, please c.f. [1], [2].
1) General Railway Power Supply System Problem Background: Railway power supply systems are by practical reasons either single phase AC or DC systems. The AC systems
are either operated at the same frequency as the public power
grid or at a different frequency, normally lower frequency.
DC railway power supplies and AC power supplies with
different frequency are similar in topologies, e.g. electric
power has to be converted to be able to flow between the
public grid and the railway grid.
The denotation Connecting Equipment (CE) is here used
as a general name for a component that is either a converter
station or a transformer connected to the three-phase public
grid. AC railway grids with public frequency typically have
transformers instead of converter stations, using two of the
public grids three phases. To reduce asymmetrical loading, the
public-grid phases connected to the railway grid, are altered
for each consecutive transformer station. Because of the 120
phase angle difference, the public-grid-frequency railway with
transformers as CEs is never fed from more than one CE per
section.
This paper focuses on loss-reduction. There are various
ways of reducing the transmission losses. Classical solutions
are:
Reduce the distance between CEs. This reduces the railway power supply system losses by the voltage control at
the taps of the CE. Reducing the distance between feeding
points is associated with substantial cost and land usage.
Besides, classical converter stations and transformer substations can only be placed at locations where there is
access to a national grid with sufficient strength. Modern
converter stations can be programmed such that the flow
of active power is limited to what the public grid tolerates,
and such that it uses the rest of its capacity for producing
as a
with
hanhave
(1)
Public grid
50 Hz
25 MVA
90 tonnes
25 MVA
90 tonnes
132 kV
16 32 Hz
16 MVA
70 tonnes
15 kV
16 32 Hz
100 km
50 km
Figure 1: Current Swedish railway power supply system solution. Both the decentralized and the centralized solutions are
visualized.
Public grid
50 Hz
+60 kV DC
- 60 kV DC
25 MVA
45 tonnes
1025 km
15 kV
16 32 Hz
Weight
DC-link
33 Hz filter
VSC
MF Transformers (400 Hz)
Cycloconverter
Line filter (15%)
Circuit breaker
Container
Total
200 kg
1500 kg
25-50 kg
1500 kg
50-100 kg
900 kg
110 kg
1030 kg
ca 5-6 tonnes
(2)
(3)
OPF: node 7
OPF: node 8
OPF: node 5
d = 1.025
OPF: PD;6
a = 0.980
OPF: PG;4
OPF: QaG;4 = 0.188
a = 0.986
CCC: PG,3
CCC: QaG,3 = 0.186
d = 1.034
OPF: PD;5
a = 0.989
OPF: PG;3
OPF: QaG;3 = 0.182
a = 0.986
CCC: PG;1
CCC: QaG;1 = 0.186
OPF: node 6
OPF: node 4
OPF: node 3
100 km
OPF: node 2
CCC: node 3
Figure 3: Case A: Single motoring train and 100 km between feeding points. OPF stands for Optimal Power Flow, whereas
CCC stands for Classical Converter Control.
OPF: node 13
CCC: node 2
OPF: node 14
CCC: node 4
OPF: node 9
OPF: node 10
d = 0.000
OPF: PD;9
a = 0.000
OPF: PG;5
OPF: QaG;5 = 0.000
a = 0.835
CCC: PG,1
CCC: QaG,1 = 0.048
d
OPF: PD;10
= 0.866
a = 0.836
OPF: PG;6
OPF: QaG;6 = 0.029
a = 0.709
CCC: P3,4
CCC: Qa3,4 = 0.107
OPF: node 6
OPF:
node 5
OPF: node 1
CCC: node 1
OPF: node 17
CCC: node 5
OPF: node 16
CCC: node 8
OPF: node 11
OPF: node 12
d
OPF: PD;11
= 0.858
a = 0.828
OPF: PG;7
OPF: QaG;7 = 0.036
a = 0.709
CCC: P7,6
CCC: Qa7,6 = 0.107
OPF: node 7
25 km
d
OPF: PD;12
= 0.000
a = 0.000
OPF: PG;8
OPF: QaG;8 = 0.000
a = 0.835
CCC: PG,9
CCC: QaG,9 = 0.048
OPF: node 8
OPF: node 3
CCC: node 7
OPF: node 4
CCC: node 9
OPF: node 2
CCC: node 3
OPF: node 15
CCC: node 6
a
ALL: PD;17/5
= 1.600
a = 1.057
OPF: U17
CCC: U5a = 1.051
OPF: node 7
OPF: node 8
OPF: node 5
d = 0.900
OPF: PD;5
a = 0.939
OPF: PG;3
OPF: QaG;3 = 0.077
a = 0.346
CCC: PG;1
CCC: QaG;1 = 0.272
d = 1.210
OPF: PD;6
a = 1.162
OPF: PG;4
OPF: QaG;4 = 0.145
a = 0.800
CCC: PG;4
CCC: QaG;4 = 0.726
OPF: node 6
OPF: node 4
OPF: node 3
100 km
OPF: node 2
CCC: node 4
OPF: node 9
CCC: node 2
a
= 1.600
ALL: PD;10/3
a = 1.012
OPF: U10
CCC: U3a = 0.982
a
= 1.600
ALL: PD;9/2
OPF: U9a = 1.162
CCC: U2a = 1.147
Figure 5: Case C: One motoring train and one braking train and 100 km between feeding points and unidirectional power flow.
OPF: node 13
CCC: node 2
OPF: node 14
CCC: node 4
OPF: node 9
OPF: node 10
d = 0.730
OPF: PD;9
a = 0.755
OPF: PG;5
OPF: QaG;5 = 0.010
a = 0.039
CCC: PG;1
CCC: QaG;1 = 0.031
d
OPF: PD;10
= 0.600
a = 0.622
OPF: PG;6
OPF: QaG;6 = 0.029
a = 0.624
CCC: P5,4
CCC: Qa5,4 = 0.060
OPF: node 6
OPF:
node 5
OPF: node 17
CCC: node 3
OPF: node 1
CCC: node 1
a
ALL: PD;17/3
= 1.600
a = 1.139
OPF: U17
CCC: U3a = 1.138
OPF: node 16
CCC: node 9
OPF: node 15
CCC: node 6
OPF: node 11
OPF: node 12
d
OPF: PD;11
= 0.679
a = 0.653
OPF: PG;7
OPF: QaG;7 = 0.066
a = 0.669
CCC: P7,6
CCC: Qa7,6 = 0.116
OPF: node 7
25 km
OPF: node 2
CCC: node 5
d
= 0.879
OPF: PD;12
a = 0.848
OPF: PG;8
OPF: QaG;8 = 0.076
a
CCC: PG;10
= 0.086
CCC: QaG;10 = 0.118
OPF: node 8
OPF: node 3
CCC: node 7
OPF: node 4
CCC: node 10
OPF: node 18
CCC: node 8
a
ALL: PD;18/8
= 1.600
a = 1.051
OPF: U18
CCC: U8a = 1.054
Figure 6: Case D: One motoring train and one braking train and 25 km between feeding point and bidirectional power flow.
When using classic converter control, the illustrated converters should be regarded as 132 kV to 15 kV transformers.
0.878
1.100
0.089
0.369
0.004
0.463
Case B
Case C
15 kV
5 MVA
1.057
1.012
1.100
1.162
0.060
0.087
0.064
0.223
0.004
0.006
0.128
0.316
Case D
1.051
1.139
0.104
0.123
0.004
0.232
D. Grid Topology
The multi-terminal HVDC (MTDC) grid is mainly radial,
with converter stations spread along the DC cable. As can
be seen in e.g. Figure 4, the radial DC grid is parallel to
the contact line, and they are connected to each other by
the use of these converters. The DC grid is connected to the
public grid in the left-hand-side end of the DC cable, can be
imagined to be located outside the upper left part of Figure 4.
This is the explanation for the slightly bigger power inflows
in the left-hand-side converter stations in Figures 3 and 4.
As a consequence, in order to even out the losses between
the converters, this is compensated for by a slightly greater
reactive power production in the right-hand-sided converter
stations.
In the proposed solution, the impedances between catenaries
and converters results in extra nodes, whereas in the classical
cases, these small impedances are included in the rotary
converter modeling. The mathematical models used in this
paper are presented in [32].
V. N UMERICAL R ESULTS
For all calculations, the computation software GAMS [33]
have been used. For the cases where systems of equations
were about to be solved, a CNS problem class was defined,
and the problem was solved using the CONOPT [34] solver
algorithm. For the cases when optimization were about to
be done the OPF cases with our suggested solution
the problem was modeled as an MINLP problem using the
local solver algorithm BONMIN [34]. Global solvers like
COUENNE [34] have been tried for test cases when the
respective solutions corresponded very well. Due to extensive
computation times, global solving can however not be done
for all the studied cases. In all the optimization problems, both
the voltage magnitude and the phase of the converters were
controllable with regard to installed apparent power. Moreover,
the converters could be either online or offline, and rectifying
or inverting; giving rise to different loss functions. This all
was subject to minimization of the total power losses in the
system.
1) Case A: The optimal point of operation is displayed
in Figure 3 with results marked OPF, whereas the classical
converter solutions are marked CCC (Classical Converter
Control) in the same figure. The voltages at the pantograph
are for both railway feeding solutions between 13.1 kV and
13.2 kV, which means that the performance of the locomotive
will, depending on type, be slightly reduced [35]. However, the
voltage quality is acceptable. The total losses are dominated
by AC transmission losses as seen in Table II.
0.875
1.097
0.372
Case B
Case C
15 kV
5 MVA
1.051
0.982
1.099
1.147
0.071
0.454
Case D
1.054
1.138
0.124
[17] S. Ostlund,
A Primary Switched Converter System for Traction Applications. No. 9201 in Trita-EMK, 1992.
10
[35] Norwegian national railway administration (Jernbaneverket), Simulations Report, Railway Electric Power Supply, Ofotsbanen (original title
in Norwegian), tech. rep., Norwegian national railway administration
(Jernbaneverket), 2007.