Influence of international harmonic standards on the design of power electronic equipments

Recent harmonic standards from the International Electrotechnical Commission (IEC) and the 1992 IEEE Standard 519 impose specific limits on the levels of current and voltage harmonics. The standard limiting harmonics will deeply influence the designer on the selection of the power electronic equipments and the methods for limiting harmonics. In most applications, it is not difficult to meet these standards, however, the most economic choices are still being developed. This paper outlines the requirements of the different standards and reviews how power electronics design options measure up to the limits.To accomplish the most popular harmonic reduction methods for three phase equipments are described and the simulation results are proposed in a typical power system.