Minimum Current-Ripple Point Tracking for Renewable Energy Applications

This paper presents a novel output voltage control of a high-gain interleaved DC-DC converter that is able to track a minimum input-current ripple. The controller encompasses three stages: a current stabilization loop, an output-voltage controller and a minimum ripple point tracking control law. The latter is a novel stage that enables a full operating region for which the input-current ripple is minimized. The proposed scheme was validated by implementing experiments in closed-loop operation. In this way, the DDBC is able to both mitigate the harmonic distortion on the current extracted from the PEMFC, which is beneficial to improve the efficiency and life-time of the cell; and on the output-voltage delivered to an output DC bus.