Model-based design of a modular multilevel converter with minimized design margins

A discrepancy between simulation and experimental results is inevitable due to their different sources of uncertainty, which are not usually incorporated at an early design stage. Therefore, design margins are used for design variables in order to generate reliable modeling and simulation-based designs. These margins are generally estimated using heuristic safety factors. In this paper, a design margin calculation procedure is proposed to minimize the allocated margin of the selected design specification when designing a converter in order to better utilize the converter's components. This procedure is based on probabilistic modeling and simulation, which take into account different sources of uncertainties.