2013 First International Conference on Artificial Intelligence, Modelling & Simulation

LabVIEW Based Study for PV Module Characteristics and Their Maximum Power
Point Tracking

Zin Mar Myint Bonghwan Kim Byeungleul Lee

Department of Mechatronics
Engineering
Korea University of Technology and
Education
Cheonan, Chungnam, Republic of
Korea
e-mail:zinmarmyint29@gmail.com
Department of Electronics Engineering Department of Mechatronics
Catholic University of Daegu Engineering
Daegu, Gyeongbuk, Republic of Korea Korea University of Technology and
e-mail:bhkim@cu.ac.kr Education
Cheonan, Chungnam, Republic of
Korea
e-mail:bllee@koreatech.ac.kr

Abstract—In this paper, we examined the solar module step size control method improves the performance of PV
characteristics at standard test condition and different on both steady and transient dynamic state.
temperature and irradiance using LabVIEW software. For full
utilization of photovoltaic(PV) system, it can be controlled by
maximum power point tracking(MPPT) algorithm. The II. PV MATHEMATICAL MODEL
LabVIEW programing can easily implement perturb and
observe (P&O) algorithm with various step sizes and their A. PV Cell Model
output characteristics. The results proved that the step size
influence on the performance of the MPPT system. The bigger The basic principle of PV cell is the PN junction diode
the step size, the less the tracking time but the more oscillation and it generates the electricity by the photovoltaic effect.
occurs in the steady state. Therefore, improved control system The equivalent circuit of solar cell is shown in Figure 1.
is required to solve that problem. The scheme that we devised
Rs
can adjust the step size automatically to improve the MPPT
speed and reduce the oscillation under steady state as well. I

Keywords—LabVIEW; PV system;MPPT;P&O; Step Size +

,SK PV cell V
Id Rsh
I. INTRODUCTION -

The alternative energy demand has been emerging due to

the crisis of the traditional energy resources such as coal,
natural gas, nuclear energy, fuel and etc. The role of solar Figure 1. PV Cell Equivalent Circuit
energy is important as the renewable energy because of
unlimited sources. Moreover, its usage does not harmful to In a general model the I-V characteristics of a PV cell can
environment and also is clean and silent. In solar system, be written as:
the power generation depends on irradiance, temperature
and other conditions. Therefore, maximum power point (

) (

)
 =  −  exp   − 1 − (1)

tracking algorithm is used to control the PV power under
the real situation. Also, we need to simulate also the PV
characteristics to examine the MPPT system. Most of the
researcher used MATLAB simulation which is very
effective to simulate the PV systems[1-3]. In this paper, we
utilized the LabVIEW (Laboratory Virtual Instrumentation
Engineering Workbench) program. It is useful not only for
simulation but also for implementing an automation system.
The purpose of this paper is mathematical modeling of
the solar module and describing the effect of environmental
factors such as irradiance and temperature to the PV system.
Using this model, we can examine the various algorithms
MPPT. Another purpose is studying the effect of step size to
the performance of the MPPT schemes and comparative
study. The simulation and experimental results shows the
978-1-4799-3251-1/13 $31.00 © 2013 IEEE
DOI 10.1109/AIMS.2013.63
 
Where  is a light-generated current or
photocurrent,  is the cell saturation of dark current,  is
the electron charge and value is 1.6 × 10 C and κ,
Boltzmann constant, is 1.38 × 10 J/K, T is the cell
working temperature, A is the ideal factor,  and  are
shunt and series resistance. The photo current depends upon
both the isolation and the cell working temperature. The
photocurrent can be calculated by using following equation.
 = [ +  ( − ! )] (2)
Where,  is the solar insolation and  is the cell
short-circuit current temperature coefficient, ! is the cell
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303
reference temperature, T is the cell operation temperature 
 = N  − N  exp   − 1 (7)
and  is the short-circuit current at STC. For defining the Y
*M

(1), the cell saturation current which changes with the cell
temperature is needed. The cell saturation current equation
can be written as III. MAXIMUM POWER POINT TRACKING

& & The amount of electrical power generated by a PV system

    
'" '
 = ! ×   exp #$% , (3) depends on irradiance, temperature, current drawn from the
" *
cells and so on. For any environmental conditions, the
system modifies the current or voltage of the solar module
Where, ! is the cell reverse saturation current at a which can generate maximum power. The load can demand
reference temperature and at solar radiation, the band-gap more power than PV delivered which have MPPT system.
energy of the semiconductor, $% and - is the ideal factor.
For describing the cell saturation current, reverse saturation
current is required to be an input. It can be solved by (4).

579
I24 = >?@9 (4)
:;< 
A7 BDE

In an ideal cell, the current  generated by the

photoelectric effect minus the diode current F is the total
current. In (1) insert  = 0 and  = ∞ respectively
assuming no series loss and no leakage to the ground. For
ideal cell equation can be written as:


 =  −  GHL   − 1 (5)
*M

B. PV Module and Array Model

PV cell can produce only low power, so the cell power is

not enough to use for an electrical appliances. PV cells can Figure 3. Maximum Power Point of PV module
be arranged in series (solar module) and solar modules
connected in series and/or parallel (solar array) to get higher A lot of algorithm to find the MPP(maximum power
energy. point) have been developed and published. In the
(Ns/Np) x Rs reference[3][4], the author described the comparative study
of MPPT algorithm. Among these techniques, the “Hill
I Climbing method” is the most common. “Perturb and
Observe” method and “Incremental Conductance method”
+
are popular because of easy implementation and good
performance. Other techniques are fuzzy logic control,
,SK PV cell (Ns/Np) x Rsh V neural network, fractional open circuit voltage or short
Id
- circuit current, current sweep are based on different
principles. Techniques to perform MPPT depend upon
sensors requirement, cost effectiveness, convergence speed,
correct tracking, complexity, hardware needed for
Figure 2. PV Module and Array Equivalent Circuit implementation and so on.

Solar array and module can be described as in (6). A. Perturb and Observe Method

R ST
QA
A 7 V
RAU
Q A
 V
The concept behind “Perturb and Observe” is “Hill-
7 U
 = N  − N  Oexp P W − 1X − 7
(6) Climbing” which can move the operating point of the PV
*M  
cell/module/array to the direction of power increases. This
is the less utilized sensor and most common method. The
Where, N and N are number of cells in series and algorithm is shown in Figure 4.
parallel in module or array of PV. For Ideal module and
array equation can be written as following

304
298
 Figure 5. Step Size Control Method

Perturb and Observe with step-size control method is the

combination of control step and tracking MPP under the
same conditions. The step size control based on the slope of
∆P and ∆V which is small when the value approach to the
zero. The larger the slope, the power is more far away from
the MPP. The bigger the slope, the larger step size will be
needed. Moreover, the step size should be small near MPP
which the slope value approximately closes to the zero for
reducing the oscillation. The step size control method
manages the step size depended upon the condition of slope
is shown in above Figure 5.

Figure 4. Pertrub and Observe MPPT algorithm

The operation voltage is measured by the sensor and the

algorithm modifies the voltage until the point will reach the
maximum power. In this method, the sign of voltage
between last perturbation and previous one and the sign of
the last increment in the power are used to decide the
increase or decrease of the operation voltage. On the left of
the MPP, the system increases the operation voltage for
increasing the power. If the point is on the right side of
MPP, the power can be increased by decreasing the
operation voltage. It means that the same direction should
be kept when the power is continuously increased and
direction of the voltage should be changed for other case.
This irritation situation is continued until MPP tracking.

B. Perturb and Observe with Step Size Conrol Method

The P&O Method tracks actual MPP even in the dynamic
situations. This method has the large oscillation near the
maximum point when we use the large step size. On the
other hand, the tracking speed is slow with the small step
size.
Figure 6. Pertrub and Observe with Step-Size Conrol Method
The step size control method performs step size
management and P&O algorithm track the Maximum power
point as shown in Figure 6. The simulation result will be
shown in next section.

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299
 IV. SIMULATION RESULTS

A. Solar Module Characteristics

The study of PV module characteristics based on the

mathematical model which are shown in equation (1) ~ (7).
Ideal equation is preferred for easy implementation of both
PV module modeling and MPPT simulation.
The PV module(SP20-12M) used for simulation and
experiment and their specifications are described in Table 1.

TABLE I. SPECIFICATIONS OF SP 20-12M Figure 8. Solar module(SP20-12M) simulation at different temperatures

Nomenclature Parameter Symbol Value

LabVIEW performs the simulation of PV characteristics
and also the effect of temperature and irradiation
Open Circuit Voltage _` 21.24V simultaneously.

Optimum Operation Voltage _a 18V B. Pertrub and Observe Method Simulation

Specification
Short Circuit Current
Open Operation Current
Band Gap Energy
Boltzmann Constant
Coulomb Constant
Reference Temperature
Constant
Ideal Factor
 1.22A
a 1.11A
$% 1.5
κ 1.38x10-23 J/K
 1.6x10-19 ℃
! 25℃
- 1.5
Perturb and Observe Method which is described in
section II is one of the most popular methods for the MPP
tracking. The Perturb and Observe Method with various
step sizes has been simulated at the various irradiance
conditions ( 0.25, 0.5 and 1 kW⁄g ) at constant
temperature 25℃ with 1500 sampling per second .The
various step sizes (0.1, 0.25 and 0.5V) are used to compare
the effect of step size. The simulation results are shown in
Figure 9

Short -Circuit
 0.003
Temperature Coefficient
Number of series cell in
N 36
module
Number of parallel cell in
N 1
module
The specification data are measured under STC
(irradiance 1 kW⁄g and temperature 25℃ and 1.5AM).

Figure 7. Solar module (SP20-12M) simulation at different irradiances

Figure 9. Simulation results of P&O MPPT algorithm with various step-
sizes

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300
 As clearly shown in Figure 9, with the large step size
(0.5V) can track MPP only 12 sampling time but the small
step size (0.1V) need 55 sampling time. The large step size
has the good tracking performance at dynamic and the small
one reduce the oscillation at stable condition and other case
is vice versa. The next section will describe the improved
control system for speed and oscillation simultaneously.
The P&O with large fixed step size(0.5V) can track
quickly but the amplitude of the oscillation is large as
shown in Figure 10. But the P&O with step size control
method shows good dynamic response and also can reduce
the oscillation at the steady state performance.

C. Pertrub and Observe Method with and without Step Size

Control Simulation and Result

This section is comparative study of perturb and observe

with and without step size control method. The conditions
of simulation I to II (decreasing the power) and II to III
(increasing the power) and their scenarios are as
summarized in Table 2.

TABLE II. CONDITIONS OF SIMULATION

Cas
Temperature(℃) Irradiation(lm/oq ) Time(min)
e
I 20 0.5 8.3
II 0 0.25 8.3
III 25 1 8.3 Figure 11. Comparison of P&O algorithm with Step-Size Control and 0.1V
fixed step size simulation

The P&O with small fixed step size(0.1V) has the same
oscillation as the P&O with control step size as shown in
Figure 11. But the tracking time is slower than the control
step size. Therefore, the step size control method is more
efficient than both small and large fixed step size.

V. EXPERIMENTAL TEST

Using the PV panel connected to electronic load(PXI

4130), we measured the operating current and voltage of the
PV system and tested the MPPT algorithm under the actual
condition. The experimental set up is as shown in the Figure
12.

G
Figure 10. Comparison of P&O algorithm with Step-Size Control and 0.5V
fixed step size simulation

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301
 Figure 12. PV MPPT experimental setup
The experimental tests are performed for 5 minutes and
delay time for each sample is 100ms. To study about
dynamic performance of MPPT, we intentionally created
partial shading (60%) on the solar module during the testing
time.
fixed step size. The control method manage large and small
step size depend upon the slope of ∆r⁄∆_ . Therefore, it is
more advantageous than the fixed step size P&O.
VI. CONCLUSIONS
This paper presents a PV characteristics and a
comparative study between traditional P&O and P&O with
control step size simulation and experimental result in
LabVIEW. The objective of step size control method is to
establish effective PV system. We have been simulated and
compared each method under different solar radiation and
temperature.
Considering the optimize power of PV, P&O with step
size control method is superior compared with traditional
one under steady state as well as dynamic condition in Table
III. The microcontroller based P&O with step size control
method is the next step of the paper.

ACKNOWLEDGEMENT

This research was supported by a grant (12 High-tech

Figure 13. Comparison of P&O algorithm with Step-Size Control and 0.1V
Urban C11) from High-tech Urban Development program
fixed step size experiment funded by Ministry of Land, Transport and Maritime Affairs
of Korean government.

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