A Novel MPPT Method Based on Inflection Voltages. (1st September 2020) - Kesilmiş, Zehan
Abstract: This study presents a novel maximum power point tracking method named inflection voltage method for photovoltaic systems. Inflection voltage method aims to find the global maximum power point using inflection voltages. It is known that multiple peaks occur in the power/voltage curves of photovoltaic arrays under partial shading conditions. Traditional methods such as perturb and observe and fractional open circuit voltage methods cannot perform MPPT with high performance in case of partial shading conditions. The inflection voltage method provides solutions to the problems of algorithms like fractional open circuit voltage and perturb and observe, such as failure to work under partial shading conditions and oscillation of output power. The success of inflection voltage method was tested first in the PSIM environment and then in the experimental setup developed. Computer simulations and experimental results showed that the proposed algorithm outperforms both fractional open circuit voltage, perturb and observe, particle swarm optimization under different partial shading conditions. Graphical abstract: Image 1 Highlights: To the best of our knowledge, the concept of inflection voltages is used for the first time in the literature as MPPT with the proposed work. The method proposed in this study requires very low processing power levels due to its simple design. The considered convergence speed and the convergence rate to reach GMPP can be significantly high.