A Fast MPPT Algorithm For Single Stage

Grid-connected PV Inverter
GU Jun-yin

CHEN Guo-cheng

School of Electromechanical Engineering and Automation

Shanghai University
Shanghai, China
junyin_gu@yahoo.com.cn

School of Electromechanical Engineering and Automation

Shanghai University
Shanghai, China
gchchen@mail.shu.edu.cn

Abstract In this paper, the power coupling relationship between

the PV array, the filtering capacitor, and the grid-connected PV
inverter was analyzed. The P/V characteristic was categorized
into three sections, the unstable area, the stable area, and the
sliding-mode stable area, a judging criterion was given. Through
theoretical and mathematical analysis, the periodic power
coupling can be reflected by the capacitor voltage and its change
in monotony. Based on the power decoupling of the capacitor in a
power cycle, by precisely calculating the required power
reference for the inverter in the following cycle, the MPPT
process can be optimized. The proposed method is especially
efficient during the MPPT dynamic process, i.e. during start-up
or when solar radiation changes sharply. An experimental 180W
prototype is designed for verification of the theoretical analysis.
Keywords grid-connected PV inverter; MPPT; power
coupling; filtering capacitor

I.
INTRODUCTION
PV grid-connected inverters can be placed into single and
double stage inverterbased on their high-frequency power
conversion stages. Since the single stage inverter has only one
high-frequency power conversion stage, it has many
significant advantages, i.e. high conversion efficiency, high
utilization of photovoltaic components and high reliability [15]. As shown in Figure 1, a single stage grid-connected PV
system includes the PV module, a grid-connected inverter and
the filtering capacitors. The PV modules output has
approximately a constant power flow, however the inverters
output has periodic fluctuations due to its grid-connecting
requirement. Therefore, filtering capacitors with large enough
capacity are necessary to balance the transient power
difference between the inverter and PV module. The filtering
capacitors in turn cause power coupling between the PV
module and the inverter.
The nonlinear relationship of the PV modules output
power and its output voltage is shown in Figure 2. In order to
achieve maximum output power, the PV module needs to be
controlled by using a maximum power point tracking
(MPPT) method [5-13]. The MPPT method is generally

pPV

C pv

PV module

Figure1.

pinv

pc

po

Single-stage
grid-connected
inverter

AC Power

Single stage grid-connected PV power system

implemented with a small perturbation in the output power of

the PV module. This allows for the determination of the PV
modules output power changing trend, which will define the
next step of the algorithm. The small perturbation method
assumes that the characteristic of the PV module output is
stable. However, light and temperature conditions or other
external factors can significantly change the output
characteristics of the PV module. Due to the filtering
capacitors power coupling effect, the change of PV module
output power cannot be reflected by the inverters output
power in real time. For that reason, the MPPT based on the
steady-state analysis cannot guarantee that the inverters
output power can follow the changes in the PV modules
output power in real time. In the worst case, the MPPT
algorithm may fail, which will lead to a system crash.
References [5-6] state that by using a single stage
photovoltaic inverter, the capacitors voltage fluctuation
reflects the power relation between the PV module and the
inverter. Current-sensor-less MPPT algorithms are analyzed,
but no steady-state or dynamic performance analysis is given.
Reference [7] analyzes the steady-state performance of the
MPPT affected by the capacitors energy storage in single
stage inverter. However, it does not analyze the mutual
relationship between the dynamic MPPT performance and the
energy storage in the capacitor. Reference [9] analyzes the
stability of the MPPT algorithm of a single stage inverter with
the introducing of a variable step algorithm to improve the
dynamic performance, but it does not analyze the effect of the
storage capacitor on the MPPT performance.
In this paper, the power coupling of the filtering capacitor
in a single stage grid-connected inverter is studied. The output
characteristic of the PV module is divided into a non-stable

c
978-1-4577-2119-9/12/$26.00 2011
IEEE

960

area, a stable area, and a sliding mode area, with an

identification criteria being given. If the output power of the

A. Power coupling relationship analysis

p
pm

A2

B2

A0

B0

A1

Figure2.

um

M Zone B Zone

N1

CAPACITOR VOLTAGE AND INSTANTANEOUS POWER

WAVEFORM

Architecture of single stage grid-connected PV system is

shown in Figure 1. In this figure, pPV is the output power of
PV module, pc is the filtering capacitor's power, and p inv and po
are the inverter's input and output power, respectively. If the
inverter losses are ignored, both are approximately equal.
According to instantaneous power balance:
p pv  pinv

p pv  po



The inverters output power po is calculated by:

 po

S II
C2

N4 p
pv
N3
t (Zt )

uc

The P/V characteristic of the PV array

pc

N 2 L2

PV module changes abruptly, the filtering capacitors voltage

changes and the power coupling relationship between the PV
module, filtering capacitor, and grid-connected inverter can be
used to accurately calculate the required power reference for
the inverter in the following cycle, by analytical calculations.
Within one power cycle, the power of the PV module, filtering
capacitor, and inverter is decoupled so to optimize the tracking
process of the MPPT and to improve its dynamic performance.

SI

L1
u

pinv

C1

B1
A Zone

II.

operating zone, such as will be demonstrated in the next

section.

p o sin 2 Zt , Z 100S 

p o is the peak output power of the inverter.

From equation (2) it can be seen that the inverters output
power po has a large ripple in the DC component, while the
PV modules output power is approximately a constant DC
flow. Between the PV module and the inverter, a capacitor
with large enough capacity is necessary to achieve power
decoupling between both sides. In the single stage gridconnected inverter system, the capacitor voltage uc is equal to
the output voltage of the PV module. The slope of the
capacitor voltage is decided by the power flow direction in the
capacitor. From figure 2, equations (1) and (2), the time
domain relationship of the voltage and power of the PV
module can be obtained, as shown in Figure 3. By analyzing
these elements, the graph area formed by p inv and pPV
waveforms reflects the power coupling in the system, while
the slope of the capacitors voltage uc, reflects the systems

0 t1 (D1 )
Figure3.

t2 (D 2 ) (S ) t3 (D 3 )

t4 (D 4 )

t (Zt )

The waveform of the capacitor voltage and instantaneous power

In figure 3, N1, N2 and N3 are the intersection points

between the PV modules output power pPV and the inverters
output power po. L1 and L2 are the subsection of the pPV
waveform between N1 to N2 and N2 to N3, respectively. C1
and C2 are the subsections between N1 to N2 and N2 to N3 of
the pinv waveform, respectively. SI is the area surrounded by
the C1 and L1 lines and SII is the area enclosed by the C2 and L2
lines.
The SI area shows that the inverters output power is
greater than the PV modules output power, so the capacitor
discharges, and its voltage uc is decreasing. SII shows that the
inverters output power is less than the PV modules output
power, so the capacitor is charging, and its voltage uc is
increasing. If the area SI is equal to SII, the stable operating
point is reached, the net power flow of the capacitor is zero
over one cycle of the grids power waveform. In that case, the
inverters output power and the PV module output power, over
one cycle, are decoupled.
B. Monotonic relationship analysis
When the system is working in zone A, pPV is rising with
the increase in uc, while in zone B, pPV and uc are inversely
proportional. If the system is working in zone M,
corresponding to the N1 to N2 and N2 to N3 segments of Figure
3, the waveform is no longer monotonic, each section is
convex, and the limit points on these sections correspond to
the MPP. As the PV powers waveform is approximately
symmetric in the M region, the N1 to N2 and N2 to N3 segments
of the waveform are also symmetric in the time domain.
Therefore, according to the relationship between the p-t and ut curves, we can determine which region the system is
operating in.
From the above analysis, the peak/bottom points of the
capacitor voltage waveform correspond to the intersection
points of the PV module and inverter output power waveforms.
The angles of the intersection at these points reflect not only
the systems operating region but also, whether the capacitors

2012 7th IEEE Conference on Industrial Electronics and Applications (ICIEA)

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power is decoupled or not, meaning that the system is either

operating in the stable or unstable point.
In Figure 3, D1 is the corresponding angle at t1 and D 2 is
the corresponding angle at t2. When the system is in the linear
region (zone A or B), from t1 to t2, the power variation is given
by:
 'p

p o (sin 2 D 2  sin 2 D1 ) 

The capacitors voltage uc decreases monotonically if the

inverters output power is more than the PV modules output
power, corresponding to the section between N1 and N2 in
Figure 3.
If the PV module is operating in zone A the output power
is decreasing monotonically, corresponding to the section N1
to N2 and 'p  0 ; whereas in Zone B, 'p ! 0 . Therefore, by
detecting the capacitors voltage behavior, the angles
D1 and D 2 of the slope change can be obtained. Furthermore,
we can determine if 'p is negative or positive, which can
determine if the systems operating point is in region A or B.
In the M region, the PV modules power waveform is
approximately symmetrical, so D1  D 2 | S , and 'p is
approximately zero. In figure 4(c) the L1 section is not
monotonic, because the system rolled over the MPP. So the L1
section presents a convex shape.
Irrespective of which area the system is operating in, the pc
changes direction at every intersection of the inverter and PV
modules output power waveform.
III. STABILITY AND DECOUPLING CONDITION ANALYSIS
By the analysis decribed below, near the MPP the system
shows a stable "variable structure sliding mode movement"
with a small swing. Therefore, the power decoupling in the M
zone constitutes a sufficient condition for stability of MPP.
A.

Stability Analysis
In Figure 2, the system is assumed to be operating in the
stable point either at A0 or B0. If there is a positive disturbance
on the inverters output power po at A0 point, this will lead to
reduction in voltage of the filtering capacitor. The PV modules
output power Ppv is correspondingly decreasing. The system
moves from the A0 to A1; the decreasing of pPV means that the
capacitor is outputting power, thus uc further declines. The
process of uc and pPV decrease constitutes a positive feedback,
which will eventually lead to a system failure. If there is a
negative po disturbance, uc will increase, the system will move
from the A0 to A2 and pPV will increase, this means that the
capacitor is absorbing energy. This movement will further
increase uc, which also constitutes a positive feedback. This
process will cause the system to go over the PV characteristic
maximum point. Zone A is the unstable region, therefore
operation in this area should be avoided.

that pPV increases and the system moves from B0 to B2. The
increasing of pPV means that the capacitor is absorbing energy,
therefore uc rises and the systems movement from the B0 to
B2 is suppressed automatically. Similarly, when there is a
negative disturbance in po, the movement from B0 to B1 is also
suppressed and the system will move back to point B0. These
two processes are both are negative feedback processes,
therefore zone B is a stable region.
In the M zone, the system is in a specially stable state, i.e.
the system is oscillating between stable and unstable regions
due to the "variable structure sliding mode movement". The
systems variable structure is the first necessary condition for
sliding movement occurrence. Whether the system is moving
from the stable zone to unstable zone or the opposite situation
is occurring, the monotonic change of PV modules output
characteristics corresponds to the change of the systems
structure. Therefore, the MPP represents the variable structure
changing point. The second necessary condition is the polarity
change of the control law. When the intersection between the
inverter power waveform and the PV output power waveform
occurs, the polarity of the power flow changes, which
corresponds to the polarity change of the control law.
In that control mode, if the capacitors power is decoupled,
there will be no change in the voltage in a power cycle, the
system rolls over the relative maximum points of the PV
power waveform and then reversely slips back to the initial
point. Therefore, the MPPT issue will be transferred into
decoupling issues in the capacitors power after the system
enters into the M zone.
B.

Analysis of power decoupling conditions

In Figure 3, if the system is operating either in zone A or B,
L1 and L2 are approximately straight lines. So C1 and C2L1
and L2 can be, respectively, given by the following formulas:
C1 : po sin 2 Zt , Zt D1 , D 2 
C2 : po sin 2 Zt , Zt D 2 , S  D1 
p  p1 p2  p1
L1 :
, D  D1 , D 2 
D  D1 D 2  D1
p  p2
p2  p1
L2 :
, D  D 2 , S  D1 
D  D 2 D 2  (S  D1 )
 

From the integration below, SI and SII can be obtained:

D2
D D
S I po sin 2 Ztd (Zt )  2 1 po (sin 2 D 2  sin 2 D1 )
D1
2
D 2  D1
sin 2D 2  sin 2D1

 po
po
2
4
D D
 2 1 p o (sin 2 D 2  sin 2 D1 )
2


At the B0 point, if the inverters output power po has a

positive disturbance, this will lead to a lower uc, which means

962

2012 7th IEEE Conference on Industrial Electronics and Applications (ICIEA)

S II

S  (D 2  D1 )

p o (sin 2 D 2  sin 2 D1 ) 
2
S  (D 2  D1 ) sin 2D 2  sin 2D1

)
p o (
2
4


1 



N2



D 2 !

3S
;
4

3S
likewise, in zone B, then D1  D 2 
.
4
4

In the M zone L1, L2 are not linear, the equations (4) to (7)
are an approximation, then we may let D1 =

S
4

G D2 =
+

where G is a very small value.

p

pinv
N1

pPV

N3
N4

N2

t (Zt )

0
uc

0 t1 (D1 )

t2 (D 2 ) (S ) t3 (D 3 )

t4 (D 4 )

t (Zt )

(a) A ZONE

t (Zt )

0 t1 (D1 ) t2 (D 2 ) (S ) t3 (D 3 ) t4 (D 4 )

t (Zt )

(c) M ZONE
Figure4.

The waveform of the capacitors voltage and instantaneous

power in different area

IV. ACTIVE DECOUPLING FOR FAST MPPT

The purpose MPPT is to achieve maximum power
generation. Therefore, the MPPT algorithm needs to assess two
indicators: the time duration that the system takes to reach the
MPP and the amplitude variation of power or voltage when
having reached the MPP.
Based on the foregoing analysis, if there is power
decoupling of the capacitor at MPP, the "variable structure
sliding mode movement" is automatically implemented within
the system. However, if the system does not enter the M zone,
power decoupling is not necessary, since whether in zone A or
B, power decoupling means that the system is relatively stable
at that point. Particularly when the system has started from the
open circuit voltage, if the power decoupling occurs in zone B,
the progress to the M zone will be slow. The fast MPPT should
be able to track the PV modules output power to pm in the
quickest way, that also means the capacitor voltage, which is
equal to PV modules voltage, lowers to ucm in the same
manner. That is inturn equivalent to that the inverter outputs
maximum power. After rising to pm, if decoupling is introduced,
the system is stablized which means that the system enters into
the "variable structure sliding mode movement" state.
In figure 4 either in zone A or B, the midpoint of the L1
section is given by:

pPV
N1

3S
-G ,
4

N4

0
uc

From equation (7) following conclusions can be derived: If

the system is operating in a stable mode, then D 2 -D1 S / 2 . If
the system is operating in zone A, then D1 !

p pv

N3

N1

Through the analysis above, if power decoupling is required,

it is necessary to ensure that SI is equal to SII. If the SI is equal
to SII, the following can be obtained:
sin 2 D1  sin 2 D 2

pinv

pinv
N3
N4

N2



pm

p1  p2
2

p inv

sin 2 D1  sin 2 D 2
2




t (Zt )

0
uc

If the system is decoupled, by using equation (7) and

equation (8), pm p inv / 2 is obtained. Therefore, if

0 t1 (D1 ) t2 (D 2 ) (S ) t3 (D 3 ) t4 (D 4 )
(b) B ZONE

t (Zt )

p invc 2 pm is given as power reference in the next power

cycle, the decoupling can be approximatly achieved.

The decoupling method above is especially suitable for

system start-up and sharp radiation changes.

2012 7th IEEE Conference on Industrial Electronics and Applications (ICIEA)

963

V.
EXPERIMENTAL RESULTS
An experimental prototype was designed with the
following parameters:

Uc:10V/div

Tab. 1 Parameters of the experimental prototype

Parameter
Rated Power/VA
Input Voltage/V
Filtering Capacitor/uF
Switching Frequency/kHz
Transformers Winding ratio
Primary Inductance/uH
Output Inductance/uH

Value
200
30
8800
151.2~448.9
16
6
600

An in-house PV simulator was used to simulate the PV

panels output characteristic. As the key issue in this paper is to
further investigate the systems dynamic performance,
differnent MPPT algorithms can be tested. The perturb and
observe (P&O) method is evaluated here.

iinv:0.5A/div
t:40ms/div

(a) MPPT without decoupling control

Uc:10V/div

iinv:0.5A/div
t:40ms/div

(b) MPPT with decoupling control

Figure6.
Uc:10V/div
iinv:0.5A/div
t:400ms/div

(a) MPPT without decoupling control

Uc:10V/div
iinv:0.5A/div
t:400ms/div

(b) MPPT with decoupling control

Uc:10V/div

iinv:0.5A/div

t:20ms/div

(c) Expanded waveform of graph b

Figure5.

964

Start-up waveforms

Waveforms when PV module output power changed

In figure (5) and (6), uc is the filtering capacitors voltage,

and iinv is the inverters output current waveform. From the
comparison of figure 5 (a) and (b), by adding the decoupling
algorithm, it can be seen that, the systems start-up time is
shorter than that without decoupling control. The start-up time
can be reduced approximately by half. From Figure 5 (c) it can
be seen that, by adding the decoupling algorithm, the system
starts at maximum power. When the capacitor voltage reaches
the maximum power point, the capacitors power coupling can
be removed within a power cycle, to ensure the system to stay
in M zone. Therefore, fast MPPT is achieved.
Figure 6 shows the experimental comparison of the
waveforms before and after adding decoupling control when
the power at MPP of the simulator drops from 160W to 90W.
Figure 6 (a) is the experiment waveform without decoupling
control. It can be seen that at the moment in which the power
drops abruptly, the system can not respond immediately in
order to track the power change, resulting in an abrupt input
voltage drop also. After this the voltage slowly rises again.
Figure 6 (b) is the experiment waveform with the decoupling
control. At sharp change in PV module characteristics, the
system can stabilize the capacitors voltage within a single
cycle. Therefore the system is safe from a voltage collapse.
Fast tracking can be achieved and the stability of the
systems performance can be ensured from the above analysis.
The experimental waveforms show the validity of the proposed
decoupling control method.
VI. CONCLUSION
By analyzing the power coupling relationship between the
single stage grid-connected inverter, the PV module and
filtering capacitor, the adverse effects of the filtering
capacitors energy storage, in the process of maximum power
tracking, are highlighted. Through theoretical analysis, a
method for removing the power coupling of the filtering
capacitor and eliminating the adverse effects on the maxi mum

2012 7th IEEE Conference on Industrial Electronics and Applications (ICIEA)

power tracking, based on the regulation of the change in the

filtering capacitor voltage, was presented. The proposed
method can eliminate the coupling relationship of the filtering
capacitor in a single power cycle. The method can improve the
dynamic performance of the MPPT. The principle of active
decoupling presented in this paper, can be combined with
different MPPT methods in order to optimize the maximum
power tracking process.
ACKNOWLEDGMENTS

The authors wish to thank the strong support from

INVOLAR Co. (Shanghai), and to express heartfelt gratitude to
Prof. Yan Xing, Dr. Li Zhang and Dr. Hongfei Wu from the
Nanjing University of Aeronautics and Astronautics, for
providing valuable discussions and materials.

[4]

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