2013 International Conference on Power, Energy and Control (ICPEC)

Modeling and Experimental validation of Solar PV system for Cascade H-Bridge Multilevel Inverter
A. Chitra
Assistant Professor (Senior), School of Electrical Engineering, VIT University Vellore, India. chitra.a@vit.ac.in
AbstractThis work envisages modeling solar photovoltaic (PV) systems as it is one of the most promising renewable energy source. A mathematical model of the PV system assumes importance as it enables the study of its performance under varying environmental and load conditions so as to assess its suitability for real time applications. To serve this purpose a mathematical model of the PV system has been developed in Matlab. The simulator is modeled to support a large array PV system, so that it can be interfaced with power electronic converters. Also the PV model has been connected with the cascade multilevel inverter (MLI) and the results are presented. The simulation results illustrate that this inverter topology is a right choice for PV applications. Keywords-; Modelingof PV systems; Cascade H-Bridge MLI; Matlab; Solar simulator;THD

S.Himavathi
Professor, Department of Electrical and Electronics Engineering, Pondicherry Engineering College Pudhucherry, India himavathi@pec.edu an indispensable part for renewable energy systems (RES). One method is to employ a boost converter with an inverter, where the boost converter increases the generated DC from the PV panel and the inverter converts the DC into an AC. Another method is to use a Multilevel Inverter (MLI)[2]. Before stepping into the exact power electronics system, it is necessary to think about the PV panel design. For an assigned load, what will be the exact number of cells required to be connected in series and parallel is to be predicted. Also to see the performance of the PV panel along with the power electronics system for various environmental conditions a simulator for the PV system is essential. Once a simulator is developed, it can be employed to test any Maximum Power Point Tracking (MPPT) algorithm or the Voltage-Current (VI) or Power-Voltage (PV) characteristics of the PV panel for any environmental conditions. The power electronics interface used in this work is MLI, since it eliminates the DC-DC boost converter stage[3-4]. There are three major types of Multilevel Inverter topologies, they are Neutral point clamped inverters, Flying capacitor type inverter which require single DC source and Cascade H-Bridge Multilevel Inverter (CHBMLI) which employs many DC sources. The later topology CHBMLI demanding many DC sources becomes a limitation when a single DC source is available, the same turns to be an advantage when utilized with PV systems[5-6]. This results in increased efficiency and reliability. This paper mainly focuses on the modeling of the PV system using Matlab / Simulink. The simulation results are validated through experimental verification. Also the performance of the PV panel is analyzed by interfacing it with the power electronics converter. The response of the CHBMLI fed from the PV panel has been presented for three level, five level and seven level. The results show that the CHBMLI is most suitable topology for interfacing with PV systems. The results of CHBMLI show that it is quiet suitable for RES. II. PV SYSTEM MODELING

I.

INTRODUCTION

The raising energy demand has been provoked as a major dispute in developing countries like India. The fossil fuels which are the conventional sources of power generation have resulted in foremost environmental problem which is the Green House Effect or Global warming. To solve these issues the renewable energy sources serve as the powerful alternatives. Out of all the renewable energy sources, solar energy has emerged as one of the promising source of energy supplier. The solar energy is green and clean energy, as it is environment friendly, inexhaustible, and renewable. Throughout the world the fossil fuels are the major source of power generation systems. This is due to their less cost and all the existing power generation units are dependent on these fossil fuels. Though not many solar plants are connected to the grid, they are gaining more attention in the fast growing countries like Germany, Japan, and Netherlands. There two major possible utility in the solar systems, they are grid connected systems and standalone systems. The PV systems directly convert the sunlight incident on it to direct current (DC) electricity. Normally a single PV cell will be generating a very low voltage which cannot be used for any consumer load. To achieve high voltages many such cells are to be connected in series and to provide reasonable current magnitude many series connected cells are to be connected in parallel which results in PV panel. For all domestic and industrial application the Alternating current (AC) electricity is required. Hence to utilize the generated DC power from the PV panel to the end utility, the power electronic converters are essential[1]. Hence these power electronics converters become

The design of the PV panel for any real time application can be easily made by predicting its VI characteristics under different irradiation and temperature. The literature has provided many mathematical models for PV panel[7]. The PV cell front view is shown in Figure.1.

978-1-4673-6030-2/13/$31.00 2013 IEEE

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2013 International Conference on Power, Energy and Control (ICPEC) The electrical equivalent circuit of a PV cell is given in Fig. 2. A PV cell is basically a large silicon PN junction, which produces DC electric power, when it is exposed to sunlight. Currently the cost of the PV panel is high compared with the conventional energy sources such as, oil, coal, natural gas, etc. But in near future, due to technological advancements and mass production the cost can come down on par with the conventional sources. Thus the PV panel mathematical model is developed in Matlab and it has been employed to predict the current generated by the light controlled current source under different irradiations and temperature. III. PV PANEL AND CASCADE H-BRIDGE MULTILEVEL INVERTER INTERFACE

Figure.1 Front view of a single PV cell

The PV panel and the CHBMLI interface is shown in Fig.3. The interface involves energy buffer which is either battery or super capacitor. The energy buffer will supply the load when solar energy is not available for example during night hours or cloudy days[8-9]. The structure of single H - bridge of the CHBMLI configuration is shown in the Figure.4. The output of this cell will have three levels namely +V, 0 and V. Using one single H-bridge, a three level inverter can be realized. This circuit requires about four switching devices. To realize higher levels of output voltage, the H-bridge circuits are cascaded .The circuit has many advantages like simple, modular, improved waveform which results in reduced total harmonic distortion.

Figure.2. Electrical equivalent circuit of a PV cell

Isun is the light controlled current source, which is directly proportional to the amount of light incident on it and is linear with respect to PV cell temperature. Cc, Dc represents the cell capacitance and cell diode respectively. Rsh, Rs denotes the shunt and series resistance. For steady state analysis the capacitance can be neglected and assuming infinite shunt resistance the circuit can be further simplified. Standard Test Conditions (STC) are assumed as 25C and 1000 W/m2 of sunlight intensity. The equations used for mathematical modeling are given as follows

Figure.3. PV panel and CHBMLI interface

I sun = [ I sun , STC + K c (Tc Tc , STC )]*

I d = I rs [ Exp (
qU d KATc

Psun Psun, STC

(1)

) 1]

(2) (3) (4) (5)

Figure. 4. Circuit diagram of Single H-Bridge of cascaded inverter

I c = I sun I d Vc = U d RS I c Pc = Vc * I c
point and STC.

Where I sun , I sun , STC are the short circuit current at working

K c , Tc , Tc , STC are temperature coefficient at

I sun , actual and STC temperatures respectively. Psun , Psun , STC

are the actual and STC light intensities respectively. Equations 3,4 and 5 provide cell current, voltage and power.

Usually more number of level are preferred in the output voltage to achieve near sinusoidal output. This reduces the Total Harmonic Distortion (THD) and hence the lower order harmonics are eliminated which in turn reduces the filter size and cost. Though the number of switches increases, the rating of the switches involved will be lesser when compared with conventional inverter of same power level due its modular structure. The modular structure also has an added advantage of utilizing hybrid DC sources available such as PV panels, Battery, etc.The number of levels in the output voltage is 2n+1, where n is the number H-Bridge units. The Figure. 5 shows the seven level CHBMLI which involves 3 H-Bridge units.

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2013 International Conference on Power, Energy and Control (ICPEC) IV.

RESULTS AND DISCUSSIONS

The PV panel is modeled using one diode model and the simulator is employed to study the VI and PV characteristics for various irradiations and temperature. To validate the PV cell model, experiment has been conducted with the solar simulator shown in Fig.5. This solar simulator includes two quartz halogen lamps as the light source and are located on top of the compartment. It has two BEL make solar cells which are located at the bottom of the chamber as shown in Figure.6. The solar cell parameters used in the simulator are given as below in Table. I TABLE. I Solar cell parameters

BEL make c-Si cell Solar cell area 14cm2 Test Conditions: Irradiance=1000 W/ m2 Temperatue= 25C VOC= 0.674V, ISC= 5.8A
Figure. 5 Solar simulator

Fig. 7 shows the voltage Vs current characteristics of the PV cell for various operating temperature and fixed irradiance. Fig. 8 provides the power Vs current curves of the PV cell for various temperatures and irradiance. From the developed matlab model for the PV cell, the PV panel has been made and the characteristics of the panel is also analyzed. For the PV panel also, as the temperature increases, the voltage output decreases. Fig. 9 shows the VI characteristics of the PV panel for various irradiance and temperature. As the temperature increases, it is evident that the short circuit current of the cell increases accompanied with a significant reduction in the open circuit voltage. Thus the efficiency of the solar cell decreases with increase in temperature. For one particular operating condition namely 1000W/ m2 at 25C, the experimental data is plotted along with the simulated curve in the Fig. 10. The red color curve represents the data obtained from the solar simulator. It can be seen that the model is validated from the data obtained through the experiment. The PV curve of the PV cell can be obtained in the same manner. For the STC the experimental data is plotted along with the model. In the Fig. 11, the red color curve represents the data obtained through the solar simulator. Both the data and the model coincides which validates the simulated model. The PV connected CHBMLI is with different output levels. As a sample the seven level CHBMLI results are shown. The multi carrier based Pulse Width Modulation (PWM) is employed as the modulation technique. As the number level

Figure. 6. Solar cells inside the chamber

increases, the order of the dominant harmonic reduces and this reduces the filter size and cost. The pulse generation using the multi carrier technique is given in Fig. 13 and 14. The pulses for the switches S11, S21 and S31 are shown in Fig.13 and these pulses are inverted and given to the switches S12, S22 and S32. Similarly the switches S13, S23 and S33 are given with the pulses as shown in Fig. 14 and inversion of these are given to the switches S14, S24 and S34. The output voltage of the seven level CHBMLI is shown in Fig. 15. The CHBMLI requires n number of DC sources which will result in the output voltage with 2n+1 levels. In the usual applications this stays as a drawback where multiple DC sources are required. But here in the RES this becomes an advantage as it makes feasible with the usage of hybrid sources such as PV panels, batteries, DC sources, etc. This also has an added advantage of having the PV panels with educed ratings as tabulated in the Table. II. Also it is clear from the table that the Total Harmonic distortion (THD) also reduces as the number of levels increase which in turn improves the system efficiency[10].

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2013 International Conference on Power, Energy and Control (ICPEC) TABLE. II Performance comparison of PV fed CHBMLI
Parameter Inverter 3 level CHBMLI 5 level CHBMLI 7 level CHBMLI No. of PV panels required 1 Voltage rating of each PV panel 42 THD of output voltage

32.2

21

28.63

14

16.75

Figure. 9. VI curves of PV panel for various temperatures and irradiations

Figure. 7. VI curves of PV cell for various temperatures Figure. 10. VI curve of PV cell model and practical PV cell

Figure. 11. PV curve of PV cell model and practical PV cell Figure. 8. PV curves of PV cell for various temperatures and irradiations

Also it can be noted that the DC voltage rating of each bridge is reduced for higher number of levels, thus the switch rating is brought down. This significantly reduces the switching losses, thus increasing the efficacy of the system [11]. 263

2013 International Conference on Power, Energy and Control (ICPEC) From the Table II, it is observed that the seven level Cascade H-bridge MLI requires three PV panels each with a rating of 14V. The output voltage of the single PV panel is shown in the Fig. 12. If only a single PV panel is available of required rating, the remaining can be DC sources, battery, etc. This leads to a topology of the hybrid CHBMLI. This CHBMLI has found to be one of the best suitable inverter topology for the RES applications. This has an added advantage of modular construction, extendable as required, and flexible to add the hybrid sources. Also this eliminates the DC-DC boost converter stage in the conventional RES interface.

Figure.12. PV panel output voltage

Figure. 14. PWM pulses using multi carrier technique for negative swing

Figure. 15. Output Voltage of PV fed 7 level CHBMLI

Figure.13. PWM pulses using multi carrier technique for positive swing Figure. 16. Output Voltage of PV fed 7 level CHBMLI

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2013 International Conference on Power, Energy and Control (ICPEC) Thus though the number levels increases the number of switches required, it has the advantages of reduced switching losses, lower ratings for the switches, reduction in THD and reduced filter size and cost. Based the application and the tolerable THD % will dictate the required number of levels.
Number of Switches Vs THD 35 30 25 20 15 10 5 0 0 5 10
Number of Switches

[6]. M.Kaliamoorthy, R.M.Sekar and I.Gerald Christopher Raj, A new single-phase PV fed five-level inverter topology connected to the grid 978-1-4244-7770-8/10, IEEE conference 2010. [7]. Ramazan Bayindir, Ilhami Colak, Orhan Kaplan Celal Can, MATLAB/GUI Based Simulation for PhotovoltaicSystems Proceedings of the 2011 International Conference on Power Engineering, Energy and Electrical Drives Torremolinos (Mlaga), Spain. May 2011. [8]. Miguel F. Escalante, Jean-Claude annier, and Amir Arzand, Flying Capacitor Multilevel Inverters and DTC Motor Drive Applications, IEEE Transactions On Industrial Electronics, Vol. 49, No. 4, August 2002. [9]. G. K. Singh, D. K. P. Singh, K. Nam, and S. K. Lim,A Simple Indirect Field-Oriented Control Scheme for Multiconverter-Fed Induction Motor IEEE Transactions On Industrial Electronics, Vol. 52, No. 6, December 2005.

THD (% )

15

20

[10]. Monti Alves Vitorino, Maurcio Beltro de Rossiter Corra, Cursino Brand Jacobina, and Antonio Marcus Nogueira Lima, An Effective Induction Motor Control for Photovoltaic Pumping IEEE Transactions On Industrial Electronics, Vol. 58, No. 4, April 2011. [11]. S. Kamel S. Mark A. Greg, Sensorless control of induction motors using multi-level converters, IET Power Electron., 2012, Vol. 5, Iss. 2, pp. 269279. BIOGRAPHY A.Chitra received Bachelor of Engineering in EEE from Government College of Engineering, Tirunelveli in the year 2001. She completed her Master of Technology (Electric Drives and Control) in Pondicherry Engg. College, Puducherry, India. Her research areas include vector controlled drives and neural networks. Mobile: Email: chitra.a@vit.ac.in. 919894760447. Dr. S.Himavathi completed her BE degree in Electrical and Electronics Engineering from College of Engineering, Guindy, Chennai, India, in the year 1984. She obtained her M.E. degree in Instrumentation Technology in the year 1987 from Madras Institute of Technology, Chennai, India. She completed her Ph.D degree in the area of Fuzzy modeling in the year 2003 from Anna University, Chennai, India. She is a Professor in the Department of Electrical and Electronics Engineering, Pondicherry Engineering College. Her research interests are Fuzzy systems, Neural Networks, Hybrid systems and their applications to Electrical Engineering. She has around 60 publications in peer reviewed journals/conferences.

Figure. 17. Number of switches Vs THD

Fig. 17 gives a pictorial view of the number of switches Vs THD for various levels of CHBMLI.
V.

CONCLUSION

One of the promising the renewable energy source, the PV system has been modeled in Matlab. The model developed is validated through the experimental kit, the solar simulator. It is evident from the results that the developed model works in a similar manner to the real solar cell. From the cell the PV panel is simulated and its characteristics is also explored. As an utility application PV panel has been interfaced with the more suitable power converter, the CHBMLI. The multi carrier based PWM technique is employed for the CHBMLI. The number levels increases the number of switches required, it has the advantages of reduced switching losses, lower ratings for the switches, reduction in THD and reduced filter size and cost. Thus for high power applications this serves as a suitable topology to be interfaced with the RES. The efficacy, modularity and reliability of the topology is being proved from the results. REFERENCES
[1]. Jos Rodrguez, Jih-Sheng Lai, and Fang Zheng Peng, Multilevel Inverters: A Survey of Topologies, Controls, and Applications IEEE Transactions On Industrial Electronics, Vol. 49, No. 4, August 2002 [2]. Srgio Daher, Jrgen Schmid, and Fernando L. M. Antunes, Multilevel Inverter Topologies for Stand-Alone PV Systems, IEEE Transactions On Industrial Electronics, Vol. 55, No. 7, July 2008. [3]. Zhong Du, Leon M. Tolbert, Burak Ozpineci, and John N. Chiasson, Fundamental Frequency Switching Strategies of a Seven-Level Hybrid Cascaded H-Bridge Multilevel Inverter IEEE Transactions On Power Electronics, Vol. 24, No. 1, January 2009. [4]. Zhong Du, Burak Ozpineci, Leon M. Tolbert, and John N. Chiasson, DCAC Cascaded H-Bridge Multilevel Boost Inverter With No Inductors for Electric/Hybrid Electric Vehicle Applications, IEEE Transactions On Industry Applications, Vol. 45, No. 3, May/June 2009. [5]. Carlo Cecati, Fabrizio Ciancetta, and Pierluigi Siano, A Multilevel Inverter for Photovoltaic Systems With Fuzzy Logic Control, IEEE Transactions On Industrial Electronics, Vol. 57, No. 12, December 2010.

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