Distributed control for modular plug-and-play subpanel photovoltaic converter system

A portable, modular, plug-and-play photovoltaic (PV) converter system is proposed in this paper. Each PV subpanel has an individual DC/DC converter connected in parallel to a semi-regulated DC bus. In order to accommodate diverse loads, a distributed control strategy for each converter is utilized so that the PV subpanel can operate at either Maximum Power Point Tracking (MPPT) mode or power shedding mode. No master-slave control scheme is used, therefore all master Central Processing Units (CPUs) and communication wires are eliminated, making the system inexpensive and mechanically resilient. The presented system is compatible with various types of PV subpanels and the reliability is enhanced. Experimental results are provided to present the concept and verify the effectiveness of this method.