Comparison of Single-Phase Rectifier with Symmetrical Switching and AC-AC Converter for the Power Factor Improvement in Hydroelectric Micro-Plants

In a previous paper the authors compared the AC-AC converters, useful for the frequency regulation in hydroelectric micro-plants varying the power dissipated in ballasts loads, with the new proposal consisting in a bridge three-phase rectifier using diodes with a serial switch with the load that is switched with symmetric angle. The paper showed that the aforementioned rectifier accomplishes to improve the power factor at the generator output, except for low power consumed by users, near to its minimal value. A way to solve this problem consists in to use three bridge single-phase rectifier using diodes with a serial switch with the load that is switched with symmetric angle. As a consequence, the objective of this article is to carry out a comparison between the aforementioned single-phase rectifier and the AC-AC converter, regarding the power factor at the output of the electric generator of hydroelectric micro-plants that regulate frequency by means of the ballast-load method.