Development of an electronic equipment managed by software on PC for controlling and driving of multiple bi-axial solar trackers in photovoltaic solar plants

This paper describes the realization of an electronic apparatus for controlling and driving a bi-axial solar tracker system of a PV plant, managed by a PC software application with an user-friendly graphical interface. The designed software is able to calculate the sun circadian orbit and consequently to move the solar panels in order to maintain the panel's surface always perpendicular to solar rays, improving the efficiency in energy production. In particular, the object of this work consists in optimizing an existing, from us designed, fully-hardware apparatus which didn't allow a simple and rapid plant management, completely replacing the Master electronic board with the designed software, able to communicate by PC with Slave electronic boards for tracker motors driving.