Design of microcontroller based I–V plotter using IGBT electronic load

摘要

A novel design of a microcontroller based I-V plotter is presented. The I-V plotter is designed using the IGBT electronic load driven with a microcontroller based algorithm. The I-V plotter is tested by obtaining the output characteristics of Photovoltaic (PV) modules in series / parallel combinations and 1 kW Fuel cell (FC). The results show that the output characteristics for both the DC generators match the expected performance. In case of the I-V characteristics of a PV generator, a correction is needed to take into account the connecting wire resistance which then yields the actual modules I-V characteristics. The maximum power point (MPP) can be located using the Hill climb method and the effect of the environmental parameters can be studied.