Multiport switch based MPPT for stand-alone photovoltaic power systems

The maximum power point tracker/controller extracts maximum power from the PV module. Therefore, an intensive research has been going on to design an effective and efficient method to transfer maximum power from PV module to load. This paper presents an overview of some classical MPPT methods such as Perturb and Observe (P&O), Incremental Conductance (IC), Fuzzy Logic Controller (FLC) and introduces a new approach to track maximum power point (MPP). The method/algorithm proposed in this paper operates based on a multiport switch. This method is found to track the maximum power faster compared to all of the conventional methods mentioned in this paper. It is found to achieve the MPP in about 0.02 sec and very fewer deviations in both power and voltage of the PV module output are observed. It is robust for moderately varying environmental conditions. All the mentioned MPPT methods are implemented in MATLAB/Simulink environment and their performances are analyzed. The model is also implemented in Hardware environment using Opal-RT (RTDS), a real-time data simulation tool and the results are plotted for proposed model.