PV-FC hybrid system with multilevel boost converter fed multilevel inverter with enhanced performance

This paper presents a multilevel boost converter fed multilevel inverter for hybrid solar PV-FC systems. Previously conventional boost converters were used to step up the voltage obtained from sources. But recently these are replaced by different high step-up Boost Converters which can produce much higher output voltage than that of conventional boost converters (BC). But all these high step-up boost converters are meant for only particular output voltage. But in this present system a multilevel boost Converter (MLBC) is used which can step-up to any voltage just by adding capacitors and diodes. The power source consists of photo voltaic generator and PEM Fuel cell. Modified P&O MPPT algorithm is used to extract the maximum power from PV system. Both boost converters fed multilevel inverter and multi level boost converter fed multi level inverter systems are modeled, simulated and their results are compared. Simulation results indicate that MLBC system produces higher output power than normal BC system based MLI for the same input voltage from PV & FC sources and load resistance.