Title: Design, development and simulation of PC-based scheme for characterisation of solar photovoltaic modules

Authors: Rajesh Kumar Nema, Savita Nema, Gayatri Agnihotri

Addresses: Department of Electrical Engineering, Maulana Azad National Institute of Technology, Bhopal 462 051, India. ' Department of Electrical Engineering, Maulana Azad National Institute of Technology, Bhopal 462 051, India. ' Department of Electrical Engineering, Maulana Azad National Institute of Technology, Bhopal 462 051, India

Abstract: This paper presents design, simulation and experimental set up for characterisation of PV cells/modules in the laboratory. A PC-based data acquisition system and associated interface circuit is developed, simulated and used for loading PV module in the laboratory to completely scan its I-V characteristics under varying environmental conditions of solar insolation and temperature. The scheme makes use of hysteresis band controller as PC interface circuit and its linear response against control variable, is established mathematically. The proposed interface circuit is simulated under PSpice to ascertain linearity of response. The comprehensive simulation exercise under PSpice is evolved and described to establish underlying principle and to emulate PC-based control. A PC programme written in |C| language acquires online data of PV module and stores it in a data file for analysis and plotting of the I-V characteristics.

Keywords: data acquisition; photovoltaic modules; boost converters; circuit simulation; PSpice; photovoltaics; photovoltaic cells; solar insolation; temperature; hysteresis band control.

DOI: 10.1504/IJPELEC.2010.034183

International Journal of Power Electronics, 2010 Vol.2 No.3, pp.304 - 325

Published online: 17 Jul 2010 *

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