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3 authors:
Santiago Silvestre
Chouder Aissa
Universit de M'sila
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Engin Karatepe
Dokuz Eylul University
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MNT Group, Electronic Engineering Department, Universitat Polite`cnica de Catalunya (UPC) BarcelonaTech, C/Jordi Girona 1-3,
Campus Nord UPC, 08034 Barcelona, Spain
b
Photovoltaic Laboratory, Development Centre of Renewable Energies, BP 62 Route de lObservatoire, 16340 Bouzareh, Algiers, Algeria
c
Department of Electrical and Electronics Engineering, Ege University, 35100 Bornova, Izmir, Turkey
Received 8 January 2013; received in revised form 2 May 2013; accepted 3 May 2013
Abstract
This paper presents a detailed procedure for automatic supervision, fault detection, and diagnosis of possible failure sources leading to
total or partial loss of productivity in grid connected PV systems. The diagnostic procedure is part of the monitoring system allowing, at
the same time, modeling and simulation of the whole system and variables measurements in real time. The fault detection algorithm is
based on the comparison of simulated and measured yields by analyzing the losses present in the system while the identication of the
kind of fault is carried out by analyzing and comparing the amount of errors deviation of both DC current and voltage with respect to a
set of errors thresholds evaluated on the basis of free fault system. The proposed method has been validated in with experimental data in
a grid connected PV system in the Centre de Developpement des Energies Renouvelables (CDER) in Algeria.
2013 Elsevier Ltd. All rights reserved.
Keywords: PV systems; Fault detection; Diagnostic
1. Introduction
The cumulative global photovoltaic (PV) capacity has
been growing exponentially latest years around the world,
especially due to the installation of grid connected PV systems (Dincer, 2011; EPIA, 2012). This growth indicates
that PV energy production will have a very important role
in the total generation of electricity of the future. But still
important eorts remain to be done in terms of cost, performance, and reliability of PV systems.
Often monitoring systems are built into inverter and are
mainly designed to connect and disconnect from the utility
during low or high voltage events, prevent islanding and
report on PV status (e.g., current, voltage, power). However, hidden defects or serious output power reduction
due to some defects in PV modules can, in most cases, be
Corresponding author.
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G
800
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Fig. 1. Synoptic of the grid connected system and monitoring system installed at CDER.
Table 1
Measured variables and precision of the instruments used in the
monitoring process.
Measured
variables
Sensors
Accuracy
GI,c
70 mW m2
GI,p GH,p
Ta
VDC
VAC
IDC
IAC
0.73 W m2
1 C
25 mV
0.64 V
0.25 mA
53 mA
At PV generator level, mismatch and non-uniform irradiance and temperature distribution over the PV generator are also sources of power reduction.
Ohmic losses, maximum power point tracking (MPPT),
and DCAC conversion eciencies are also cause of
additional power losses.
Despite main power reduction causes are known, it is
very hard to quantify separately the amount of power
reduction; due to an individual eect, more additional data
and specic test bench are required (Firth et al., 2010).
However, it is established that the overall losses could be
gathered on few power losses indicators as mentioned by
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meas
Lc
sim j
Hi
Edc
G; T c
Gref
P ref
where Yr(G, Tc) and Ya(G, Tc) are the reference and array
yields, respectively, at real working irradiance, G, and real
cell temperature Tc, Hi is the total irradiation in array plane,
Gref is the reference irradiance at STC (1000 W m2), Edc is
the energy produced by PV array, and Pref is the maximum
power output of PV array.
Moreover, these global losses can be divided into two
types of losses; thermal and miscellaneous capture losses
denoted as Lct and Lcm, respectively. Thermal losses are
due to the decrease in DC output power when the PV modules are working at temperatures higher than reference
temperature (25 C). Miscellaneous capture losses are
mainly due to shading, ohmic losses, low irradiance losses,
angle of incidence losses, module failure, string failure,
MPP tracker failure etc. Equations allowing nding thermal and miscellaneous capture losses are given by (Haeberlin and Beutler, 1995):
ref
2rELc
6 ELc 6 ELc
ref
2rELc
ref
This learning procedure can be applied to any grid connected PV system in order to obtain its particular thresholds for a correct fault detection evaluation. Fig. 4 shows
the ow chart of the following procedure to detect malfunction in operational PV system.
3.2. Set up of fault diagnosis procedure
When the ELc parameter exceeds the limit set, indicating
the presence of a fault in the PV system is necessary to
determine the most probable cause of this fault. In order
to isolate the fault detection and failure type, we dene
two indicators of the deviation of the measured DC variables with respect to the simulated ones. These indicators
are the current error, Ei, and the voltage error, Ev, given
by the following expressions:
Lct Y a G; 25 C Y a G; T c
Ei jI dc
Lcm Lc Lct
Ev jV dc
From the measured weather parameters and electrical variables, the developed software calculates the instantaneous
capture losses, Lc, and then derives thermal and miscellaneous capture losses. On the other hand, the simulated
losses are also evaluated using the simulation model from
the measured weather variables, G and Tc. This procedure
allows the comparison between simulated and measured
ref
meas
I dc
meas
sim j
V dc
sim j
Table 2
Mean and standard deviation for reference errors.
Standard deviation r
ELc_ref (Wh/Wp/day)
Ei_ref (mA)
Ev_ref (V)
4
1.55 10
108
4.30
Mean value
1.8 104
136
4.65
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9
10
The diagnostic procedure has been experimentally validated in a grid connected PV system of 9.6 kWp sited at
the CDER in Algeria that has been previously described
in Section 2. The following types of faults have been identied in the PV system: Inverter disconnection, partial
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Fig. 10. Simulated versus measured array yields in case of grid failure.
Fig. 11. Capture losses error versus reference capture losses thresholds in
case of grid failure.
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Fig. 15. Capture losses error versus reference capture losses thresholds in
case of shading.
Fig. 16. Current error versus reference current errors thresholds in case of
shading.
Fig. 13. DC voltage error versus reference voltage errors thresholds in
case of grid failure.
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Fig. 18. Simulated and measured array yields in case of string failure.
Fig. 19. Capture losses error versus reference capture losses errors
thresholds in case of string failure.
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