A High-Efficiency 2-Switch Bipolar Boost Converter with PV-assisted Startup Voltage for the Bipolar Thermoelectric Energy Harvesting

With the great application potential of the Internet of Things (IoT), a reliable power supply solution for IoT plays an important role during the development of IoT and other advanced applications. Among all the options including the electricity grid, batteries, and energy harvesting systems, the energy harvesting systems are considered with...

Developing and Controlling a Hybrid Renewable Energy System with Solar PV and Modular Alkaline Electrolysis: The Future of Decentralized Hybrid Renewable Energy Systems

Renewable energy resources like wind and solar have the potential to revolutionize our energy infrastructure and enable a decarbonized society. The intermittent nature of renewables poses a challenge to ensuring a consistent and reliable electricity supply. Hydrogen technology is emerging as a promising solution for stabilizing renewable energy...

Analytical Overvoltage and Power-Sharing Control Method for Photovoltaic-Based Low-Voltage Islanded Microgrid

Overvoltage instability is a growing concern in a standalone low-voltage (LV) microgrid (MG) with non-dispatchable intermittent renewable energies such as residential and commercial photovoltaic generators (PVGs). Several overvoltage controllers used in PV arrays have adopted the concept of standard deviation from the maximum power point (MPP...

Energy Harvesting PMIC Design for an Extended Power-Range

This work proposes an energy harvesting DC-DC converter that is able to efficiently process a wide input power range from 25 mW up to 250 mW, to charge a storage device used in Internet-of-Things (IoT) applications. An interleaved boost-converter topology with two inductors is used to divide the high currents over the two branches, in order to...

Study on the Effect of Irradiance Variability on the Efficiency of the Perturb-and-Observe Maximum Power Point Tracking Algorithm

Irradiance variability is one of the main challenges for using photovoltaic energy. This variability affects the operation of maximum power point trackers (MPPT) causing energy losses. The logic of the Perturb-and-Observe MPPT algorithm is particularly sensitive to quick irradiance changes. We quantified the existing relation between irradiance...

A 10-mV-Startup-Voltage Thermoelectric Energy Harvesting System With a Piezoelectric Starter

An ultra-low-startup-voltage thermoelectric energy harvesting system assisted by a piezoelectric generator (PEG) is presented in this paper. When the energy harvesting system is implemented in a place where there is mechanical vibration, the associated PEG can generate a stable clock signal and drive the boost converter to start from the cold...

High power quality maximum power point tracking-based islanding detection method for grid-connected photovoltaic systems

Islanding is a condition when distributed generators (DGs) are disconnected electrically from the upstream network. This unwanted situation should be detected effectively to ensure the safety of the maintenance staffs and power quality (PQ) requirements. This paper presents a new high PQ maximum power point tracking (MPPT)-based methodology for...

Maximum Power Point Tracking Injection Method for Islanding Detection of Grid-Connected Photovoltaic Systems in Microgrid

This paper proposes a novel islanding detection method (IDM) for grid-connected photovoltaic systems (GCPVSs) through a disturbance injection in the maximum power point tracking (MPPT) algorithm. When an absolute deviation of the output voltage exceeds a threshold, the applied disturbance shifts system operating point from its maximum power...

Dual-input photovoltaic system based on parallel z-source inverters

This paper aims to present a new structure of the parallel Z-source inverters (ZSIs) for dual-input single-phase grid-connected photovoltaic (PV) systems. The ZSI is a single-stage buck-boost converter that uses an inductor-capacitor network between the inverter bridge and the PV string and follows the maximum power point by applying the...

Two-Level Islanding Detection Method for Grid-Connected Photovoltaic System-Based Microgrid with Small Non-Detection Zone

This article proposes a fast and reliable two-level islanding detection method (IDM) for grid-connected photovoltaic system (GCPVS)-based microgrid. In the first level of the proposed IDM, the magnitude of the rate of change of output voltage (ROCOV) is computed. If this variable exceeds a predefined threshold, a disturbance is injected into...

Quantification of Shading Tolerability for Photovoltaic Modules

Despite several decades of research in the field of photovoltaic (PV) systems, shading tolerance has still not been properly addressed. PV modules are influenced by shading concerning many factors, such as number and configuration of cells in the module, electrical and thermal characteristics of the cells, number and type of bypass circuits,...

Maximum power point tracking: Algorithm and software development

Currently, the Nuon Solar Team is building their new solar car, which makes use of solar panels. Solar panels have a Maximum Power Point (MPP), which, when operated at that point, ensures the maximum available power is obtained from them. In this thesis, different options were explored to solve the problem of tracking the MPP of a solar panel....