Harmonic and Supraharmonic Emissions of the Electric Vehicle Chargers in Distribution Networks

Electric mobility is seen as one of the primary levers for hastening the energy transition. The impact of electric vehicles (EVs) in charging mode on distribution networks is of major relevance for Power Quality (PQ) issues. The PQ issues associated with the distortions induced by EV charging cover a higher frequency range (up to 150 kHz) than standard harmonics (up to 2 kHz), therefore their emissions analyses must consider the so-called supraharmonics (9-150 kHz). This is because of the converter type and control technique utilized to charge an EV. This is a companion study to a paper that analyzes and characterizes the cumulative emissions of numerous EV charging currents using innovative indicators. The goal of this paper is to develop a simplified time-domain model of the EV charger that will be used in the companion paper. The converter under consideration is a PFC (Power Factor Corrector), which is currently the most used unidirectional converter for charging EV battery storages. The research discusses the emission of a single EV charger using this model and predicts the consequences of variations in absorbed power and ac network parameters. The analyses are performed with and without the EMI filter to demonstrate its influence on emissions. The findings show that the EMI filter influences the harmonics as well, and the supraharmonic spectrum has a prominent band about 20 kHz that does not vary when the operating conditions or circuit parameters change.