A burst-mode based boost converter harvesting photovoltaic energy for low power applications

This paper presents a boost converter used to harvest photovoltaic energy, one of the most important renewable energy sources, and to converter it into a power supply for micro power devices. To meet the low power requirements of applications such as wireless sensor network, the converter is designed to work at burst-mode to reduce power consumption. And a simple Maximum Power Point Tracking (MPPT) scheme, based on open voltage detection, is also utilized in the system to increase the system's power efficiency. The chip, which integrates the power MOSFETS in it, was implemented in Global Foundry 0.18 μm, 1.8/3.3 V, RFCMOS process, and its power efficiency reached 80% at 80 mV input voltage and 100 μA load current, according to the simulation results.