Sizing Sampling Rate of the Integrated PV Simulator

摘要

PV simulators are now mandatorily used to evaluate the performance of balance of system viz. battery chargers, inverters and unidirectional DC-DC simulators to avoid the time-consuming and costly field testing process. Moreover, to precisely tune the MPPT controller, we often require sustained environmental condition and status-quo for parameters; thus, PV simulators have become indispensible equipment for PV system prototyping. Further, as MPPT algorithms are more-or-less standardized, the PV simulator may be more effectively integrated with Incremental Conductance based MPPT algorithm to realize the integrated PV simulator (IPVS). Since the characteristics of each PV panel varies from manufacturer to manufacturer and parameters are selectable, the PWM frequency of buck converter used for hardware realization of IPVS and selection of an appropriate sampling rate for PV simulator for realizing the quantized digital emulation of PV panel closed to its actual operation becomes critical. This paper presents the development of a low cost microcontroller based real time IPVS which controls the interfaced buck type MPPT DC-DC power converter for emulation of PV panel close to its actual operation with flexibility or dynamic changes in characteristics. The developed algorithm is able to configure both the PV module of any make or type to its characteristics and related dynamics to be simulated and the environmental conditions under which it operates. The presented experimental results demonstrate the effectiveness of the proposed method in replicating of I-V characteristics of considered PV panel with high accuracy.