Power converter

A power converter, comprising:

• an electrical storage unit;
• a plurality of power conversion units connected to one another in parallel, each of the power conversion units including:
• a rectifier that converts AC power from a commercial power supply into DC power,
• a DC power converter that is connected to the rectifier on one end and connected to the electrical storage unit on another end and that converts the DC power from the rectifier when charging the electrical storage unit and converts DC power from the electrical storage unit when discharging the electrical storage unit, and
• a current detector that detects charge current that flows from the DC power converter to the electrical storage unit as well as discharge current that flows to the DC power converter from the electrical storage unit;
• and
• a controller that controls the respective DC power converters of the plurality of power conversion units such that when charging the electrical storage unit, only a subset of the DC power converters, not all of the DC power converters, among the respective DC power converters of the power conversion units charges the electrical storage unit,
• wherein each of the plurality of power conversion units further includes an AC power converter that converts the DC power from the rectifier or DC power from the DC converter when the electrical storage unit is discharging into AC power and supplies the AC power to a load, and
• wherein the controller changes a number of active DC power converters in the subset when charging the electrical storage unit on the basis of current flowing from the AC power converters to the load.