Characteristics of solar PV array under partial shaded conditions

Increasing prices of fossil fuels and awareness of global warming have drawn attention towards the use of Solar Photo Voltaic Cells as an alternative source of electric power. Experimental determination of voltage-current characteristic of a solar panel is required for its simulation and setting the parameters of the circuit for extracting maximum power. An attempt to determine such a characteristic by connecting a variable resistance across the panel and measuring the voltage and current by meters is not successful all the times due to varying cloud positions and temperature during the experiment. A method to quickly draw the characteristics and recording the result using electronic load has been presented in this paper.