ADIGRAT UNIVERSITY

COLLEGE OF ENGINEERING AND TECHNOLOGY

DEPARTMENT OF ELECTRICAL AND COMPUTER

ENGINEERING

STREAM: INDUSTRIAL CONTROL ENGINEERING

SEMISTER PROJECT
PROJECT TITLE ON: DESIGHN AND SIMULATION OF AUTOMATIC
SOLAR CHARGE CONTROLLER FOR 12 VOLT PHOTOVOLTAIC SYSTEM
Prepare proposal By
NAME OF STUDENT ID NO
1. Abeba Hailay………………………………… .RET 00676 /08
2. Selemon Girmay………………………………… .RET02120 /08
3. Welday Atsbha………………………………………RET 02443/08

Advisor Name:Mebrahtu Nugus

Submission Date 15/09/2011E.C

Adigrat Tigray,Ethiopia
 ABSTRACT
Automatic photovoltaic charge controller is very important in Photovoltaic system. In this project,
a Photovoltaic Charge Controller will be designed based on microcontroller (PIC 16F877A) which
Reduced complexity in the number of electronic components and increased monitoring and
regulative functions. The charge controller is responsible for overcharging and deep discharging of
the batteries. The designed circuit consists of system status displays LCD, has low current
consumption, automatic dusk-to-dawn operation and have high efficiency due to usage low power
consumption microcontrollers.The charge controller disconnect the solar panel when the battery
state so charge reaches the highest threshold and disconnect the load through Load shading relay
when the battery state of charge reaches the minimum threshold and, controller reconnect
automatically connect the solar panel to charge the battery when there is enough sun shine. During
design phase software simulation has been (Proteuse software) used to test and validate the proper
functioning of the circuit. The constructed charge controller operates as intended and validated for
smooth operation by testing several times. Furthermore, the designed controller is cheap and can
be constructed in Ethiopia and can save considerable amount of hard currency that otherwise spent
on importing the charge controller.
Contents
ABSTRACT.....................................................................................................................................................ii
LIST OF TABLES............................................................................................................................................iv
LIST OF FIGURES............................................................................................................................................i
ABBREVIATION.............................................................................................................................................ii
CHAPTER ONE..............................................................................................................................................1
1. INTRODUCTION........................................................................................................................................1
1.1. Statement of the problems..........................................................................................................1
1.2. Objective......................................................................................................................................1
1.2.1. General objective.......................................................................................................................1
1.2.2. Specific objective........................................................................................................................1
1.3. Scope of the project.....................................................................................................................2
1.4. Beneficiary of the project.............................................................................................................2
CHAPTER TWO.............................................................................................................................................3
2. LITERATURE REVIEW................................................................................................................................3
CHAPTER THREE...........................................................................................................................................4
3. Methodology...........................................................................................................................................4
3.1. Block diagram....................................................................................................................................6
3.2. Materials Required.......................................................................................................................7
3.3. Cost Estimation............................................................................................................................8
3.4. Time Schedule...................................................................................................................................9
REFERENCE................................................................................................................................................10
 LIST OF TABLES

Table 1 Cost estimation.....................................................................................................................

Table 3 Proposal Time Schedule......................................................................................................
 LIST OF FIGURES

Figure 3.1 Flow chart of methodology..............................................................................................

Figure 3.2 Block diagram....................................................................................................................

 ABBREVIATION

SHS…………………………………….....Solar home System

ASCC……………………………………..Active state of charge control

PV…………………………………………Photovoltaic

MPPT…………………………………… Maximum power point Tracker

IC………………………………………….Integrated circuit

LCD……………………………………... Liquid crystal display

 CHAPTER ONE

1 INTRODUCTION
Photovoltaic is one of the renewable energy resources that recently has become broader in
nowadays technology. PV has many benefits especially in environmental, economic and social.
In general, a PV system consists of a PV array which converts sunlight to direct electricity, a
control system which regulates battery charging and operation of the load, energy storage in
the Batteries, inverters and loads or appliances. A charge controller is one of functional and
reliable major components in PV systems. A good, solid and reliable PV charge controller is a
key component of any PV battery charging system. The main function of a charge controller in
a PV system is to regulate the voltage and current from PV solar panels into a rechargeable
battery, to disconnect the array when the battery is fully charged and keep the battery fully
charged without damage and important to prevent battery overcharging and to protect battery
from excessive discharging, reverse current flow at night [1].One of the best ways to get power
to remote, off-grid locations, whether in developed or developing countries is through SHS.
The system consists of Solar PV, battery, and a solar charge controller. In most cases
consumers consume solar energy at evening time. So, solar energy is stored into batteries. A
solar charge controller is similar to the voltage regulator. It regulates the voltage that is coming
from the solar panels and going to the battery. Most of the batteries are fully charged at 14.
9volts. On the other hand, battery's life time drastically reduces due to the discharge over the
level of 50%; at this discharge level the battery voltage normally goes down to 11.4volts. Each
battery has a certain limit of capacity. Battery lifetime reduces drastically due to overcharging
and deep discharging. As battery is a very expensive component of a Solar Home System, it is
necessary to protect the batteries from being over charged or deeply discharged. In this case
charge controller plays a vital role to protect the battery [2] In Ethiopia, all types of solar
charge controllers are imported from abroad. With the

government green growth strategy and the number of rural people left for off grid
 electrification, designing and constructing charge controller can save considerable amount of
foreign currency. Moreover, the market for solar charge controller is huge in Ethiopia.
Therefore, this project work verifies that it is possible to design and construct charge controller
from available material in the market in Ethiopia.

1.1. Statement of the problems

The demand for solar power in Ethiopia increasing from year to year especially to electrify
85% of people living in rural area. With its Modular nature coupled with disperse settlement of
rural people, solar photovoltaic based electrification is very suitable in Ethiopia. Currently,
rural peoples started to use solar home system for light during night time. However, the initial
cost of this system is high and not affordable by most of rural people. One method of reducing
the cost is manufacturing some of the components here in Ethiopia. The government already
started to assemble solar panel in the country but no company, car batteries are modified and
designed to be suitable for solar system but still no company started to manufacture solar
charge controller which is the brain of the system. Therefore, this project takes initiative to
bridge this gap by designing and constructing low cost prototype charge controller for 12 volt
solar system.

1.2. Objective
1.2.1. General objective
 To design and simulation of low cost automatic solar charge controller for 12 volt
standalone PV lighting systems by using PIC microcontroller.
1.2.2. Specific objective
 To design and simulate the charge controller circuit by using Proteuse software and to
test and validate operation of the circuit before constructing the hard ware
 To construct the corresponding hard ware circuit and test for its functionality according
to the written program.
1.3. Scope of the project
The scope of this project is to design an intelligent automated electronic charge controller
circuit for the lighting of 12 volt standalone photovoltaic systems by using PIC micro
controller and test and validate its operation in different battery state of charge level.

1.4. Beneficiary of the project

 The government of Ethiopia by saving the foreign currency.
 The whole Ethiopia people due to country construction of charge controller and its
reduced price.
 CHAPTER TWO

2 LITERATURE REVIEW
A lot of research work has been published in the field of PV charger system various techniques
has been proposed.

Chiang et al [1]. His paper Presented the modeling and controller design of the PV charger system
implemented with the single-ended primary inductance converter (SEPIC) and gave a detailed
modeling of the SEPIC with the PV module input and peak-current-mode control. The system has
been proved to be effective in the MPPT and power balance control. The MPPT controller was
implemented with the Mat lab real-time control in their study.

Harrington and Dunlop [2]. Analyzed the typical strategies for battery charge regulation in stand-
alone PV systems and conclude that the battery information is very important in designing PV
systems.

Ullahetal [3]. Focused on the design of a super-fast battery charger based on National’s
proprietary neural network based neural fuzzy technology. They compared their method with
conventional fast chargers and indicate that their method reduce the charging time.

Masheleni and Carelse [4]. Designed an intelligent charge controller, incorporating an SGS-Thompson
microcontroller; ST62E20 and discussed the advantages of such charge controllers.

Hsiehetal [5]. Proposed a fuzzy-controlled active state of-charge controller (FC-ASCC) for
improving the charging behavior of a lithium–ion (Li–ion) battery. In this method, a fuzzy
controlled algorithm is built with the predicted charger performance to program the charging
trajectory faster and to remain the charge operation in a proposed safe-charge area (SCA). They
increased the charging speed about 23%.

The main focus of this project is to design and simulate automatic solar charge controller for 12
volt Photovoltaic systems. It is needed in photovoltaic system to safely charge and discharge the
battery.
 CHAPTER THREE

3 Methodology
We will do this project by searching different data regarding our project. The methodology that
we followed are listed below

Searching and Studying of

related literature

Studying and Selecting of the

required materials

Determining the specification

of the selecting materials

Wright coding

Compile the coding program

Designing the circuit based

on their specification

Burn the program on the

micro controller

Developing simulation

Figure 3.1 Flow chart of methodology

3.1 Block diagram

Figure 3.2 Block diagram.

3.2 Materials Required
The materials we will use in our project are different books, journals, thesis and ongoing
projects in automatic solar charge controller for PV standalone lighting system. From this we
are going to select appropriate rating of:-

 Battery (12V)

 Solar panel (10W,12V)

 Relay (12V)

 Transistor (NPN)

 Microcontroller (PIC16F877A)

 Diode

 Resistors

 Capacitor

 Crystal (6MHz)

 Voltage regulator (L7805)

 LCD display

Based on their application in automatic solar charge controller for PV standalone lighting
system and analyzed values. The other material we will use for our simulation is proteuse
software.
3.3 Cost Estimation
The cost of all components used to design the system is listed as shown in table below:
Table 1: Cost estimation

No Quantity Cost unit Total cost

List of component

1 Resistor 1.5 k ohm 5 25 125

2 Resistor 1 k ohm 2 20 40

3 Resistor 10 k ohm 3 40 120

4 Capacitance 10 micro farad 1 45 45

5 Capacitance 22 micro farad 2 50 100

6 Capacitance 100 micro farad 1 55 55

7 Diode 3 20 60

8 PCB board 1 350 350

9 Relay 2 250 500

10 LCD display 1 200 200

11 Transistor 2 25 50

12 Microcontroller 1 975 975

13 Potentiometer 1 200 200

14 Voltage regulator 1 150 150

15 Crystal 1 100 100

16 Direct labor 4 70/hour 250

17 Indirect material 120

18 Indirect labor 60/hour 360

19 Other material 200

20 Total Cost 4000

 3.4 Time schedule
Table 2: Time schedule

No tasks to be performed March March April April May May June June
1st -2nd 3rd-4th
2nd 3rd_4th 1st_2nd 3rd-4th 1st_2nd 3rd-4th
week
week week week week \
week week week
1 Time organization and topic
selection 

2 literature serving on project    

3 composition of overall writing 

thesis proposal

4 working for overall project in     

detail body part

5 proof the project using an  

appropriate software

6 Overall check conclusion  

7 Presentation 

REFERENCE
[1] NOOR JUWAINA AYUNI BT. MOHD (PHOTOVOLTAIC CHARGE CONTROLLER).
[2] Mohammad Shariful Islam, Low Cost Solar Charge Controller (Lambert
Academic Publishing, 2012).
[3] Everett M. Barber and Joseph R. Provey, Convert Your Home to Solar Energy (Taunton
Press, 2010).
[4] Thomas P J Crompton, Battery Reference Book (Newnes, 2000) Christian Glaize,
Sylvie Genies, Lead-Nickel Electrochemical Batteries (John Wiley & Sons, 2012).
[5] Isidor Buchmann. Batteries in a Portable World (Battery University, 2011.