Prognostics and diagnosis of catastrophic faults in photovoltaic array and reliability centered maintenance (rcm) for power converters using spread spectrum time domain reflectometry (sstdr)

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Title Prognostics and diagnosis of catastrophic faults in photovoltaic array and reliability centered maintenance (rcm) for power converters using spread spectrum time domain reflectometry (sstdr)
Publication Type dissertation
School or College College of Engineering
Department Electrical & Computer Engineering
Author Alam, Mohammed Khorshed
Date 2015
Description Three major catastrophic failures in photovoltaic (PV) arrays are ground-faults, line-to-line faults, and arc faults. Although the number of such failures is few, recent fire events on April 5, 2009, in Bakersfield, California, and April 16, 2011, in Mount Holly, North Carolina suggest the need for improvements in present fault detection and mitigation techniques, as well as amendments to existing codes and standards to avoid such accidents. A fault prediction and detection technique for PV arrays based on spread spectrum time domain reflectometry (SSTDR) has been proposed and was successfully implemented. Unlike other conventional techniques, SSTDR does not depend on the amplitude of the fault-current. Therefore, SSTDR can be used in the absence of solar irradiation as well. However, wide variation in impedance throughout different materials and interconnections makes fault locating more challenging than prediction/detection of faults. Another application of SSTDR in PV systems is the measurement of characteristic impedance of power components for condition monitoring purposes. Any characteristic variations in one component will simultaneously alter the operating conditions of other components in a closed-loop system, resulting in a shift in overall reliability profile. This interdependence makes the reliability of a converter a complex function of time and operating conditions. Details of this failure mode, mechanism, and effect analysis (FMMEA) have been developed. By knowing the present state of health and the remaining useful life (RUL) of a power converter, it is possible to reduce the maintenance cost for expensive high-power converters by facilitating a reliability centered maintenance (RCM) scheme. This research is a step forward toward power converter reliability analysis since the cumulative effect of multiple degraded components has been considered here for the first time in order to estimate reliability of a power converter.
Type Text
Publisher University of Utah
Subject Converter; Diagnosis; Fault; Prognostics; Reliability
Dissertation Name Doctor of Philosophy
Language eng
Rights Management ¬©Mohammed Khorshed Alam
Format application/pdf
Format Medium application/pdf
ARK ark:/87278/s6740vw2
Setname ir_etd
ID 1343456
Reference URL https://collections.lib.utah.edu/ark:/87278/s6740vw2
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