A new MPPT method for partially shaded PV system by combining modified INC and simulated annealing algorithm

Partial shading on a photovoltaic (PV) string will lead to PV characteristic, exhibiting multiple peaks. Conventional methods such as P&O method may not track the Global Maximum Point (GMP). Researchers have utilized meta heuristic approaches to track the GMP. Recently Simulated Annealing (SA) method has also been adapted for Maximum Power Point Tracking (MPPT) because of its simplicity and effectiveness to locate the region which is near global maximum. However, it's tracking time to obtain GMP is excessively long. In this paper, we combine SA method with a Modified INC method to improve tracking time of the SA. The modified INC method employs an adaptive step size to increase the tracking speed and accuracy of the conventional INC. To validate the performance of the proposed algorithm, experimental verifications are conducted. Both results indicate that the proposed algorithm can perform as well as SA in term of the tracking efficiency but it only requires very short tracking time. On average, the tracking time of the proposed method is two times shorter than the SA method.