Photovoltaic simulator developed in LabVIEW for evalution of MPPT techniques

Photovoltaic Systems are gaining importance rapidly. The performance of the photovoltaic system is hugely dependant on atmospheric conditions. The performance evaluation of the PV systems before on site installation is costly and time consuming. Also, MPPT techniques play a vital role in photovoltaic systems, however on site testing of MPPT techniques is somehow difficult. A PV simulator can be used in replacement of PV arrays for the performance evaluation of the complete system alongwith MPPT accurately in the laboratory. This paper presents the PV simulator based on real-time execution of the PV array mathematical model. The PV model is simulated in LabVIEW and interfaced to the real world through a data-acquisition system. The simulator is further used to test the performance of MPPT techniques under uniform radiation as well as non-uniform radiation. The performance of new Golden Section Search(GSS) technique is evaluated using the proposed simulator. The comparative performance of the GSS technique with conventional MPPT techniques is presented to prove its capability. The dynamic operating tests under various shading pattern are demonstrated with PV emulator to ascertain the efficacy of the MPPT technique.