2016 IEEE International Conference on Power and Renewable Energy

A 1kW Synchronous Buck Converter for Solar Powered Conduction Cooking

System in off-grid areas of Bangladesh

Zaima Tasneem, Saila Ishrat Annie, Mohammad Rejwan Uddin and Khosru M Salim
Department of Electrical and Electronic Engineering
Independent University, Bangladesh
Dhaka, Bangladesh
e-mail: zaimatasneem@gmail.com; ishrat_annie@yahoo.com; rejwanuddin@yahoo.com; khosru@iub.edu.bd

Abstract—Depletion of Natural Gas and increasing price of kerosene stoves. But rapid price increase and inefficiency
LPG, burning wood, coal etc, are now the main menaces for are some unavoidable issues of these fuels. Therefore,
cooking purposes in Bangladesh. On the other hand, people are in need of an alternate solution to fulfil their
inefficient burning of wood, charcoal, agricultural wastes and cooking requirements. In Fig.1 a conventional cooking stove
animal dung etc, generate smoke and emits ozone gases. This using fuel wood is shown.
results in global warming and health issues due to inhalation
of the smoke. Because of a good solar irradiation pattern, a
solar powered conduction cooker can minimize this burden
from the nation. The purpose of this paper is to design, analyse
the prospect and performance of solar powered conduction
cooking system by using Thin Film photovoltaic modules with
a novel synchronous Buck Converter Controller topology.
Physical demonstration was made by installing 1 kW Thin
Film PV modules on the rooftop of the university building
with setting up the conduction cooker and other measuring
equipment. 10 panels of 95 Watt are mounted on the rooftop
of the university building. Based on solar irradiation data
round the year, projected output is analysed by using PSIM Figure 1. Cooking stove of rural areas and its smoke emission.
simulation and the prospect of solar powered conduction
cooker in Bangladesh is shown with economic feasibility. The Induction cooker or electric heater can be used as clean
system was designed and analysed in PROTEUS software and and smart cooking solution. But, it is expensive and difficult
the hardware was fabricated and implemented. Based on the to avail grid power everywhere, especially in rural and
experimental data, the performance of the system is also remote areas.
analysed and presented in this paper. Increase in power generation or finding out other energy
sources is required to fulfil this demand. Sustainable energy
Keywords-solar irradiation; synchronous buck converter; can be used for cooking with less waste and pollution. Solar
conduction cooking system; thin film photovoltaic module; has the most potential which is the most abundant,
performance analysis; economic analysis inexhaustible and clean source of energy in Bangladesh [4].
Electrical energy produced by solar cell, can be used to
I. INTRODUCTION
generate heat energy. A solar powered conduction cooker is
In Bangladesh the main cooking fuel in urban areas is simpler and hassle free solution. Fig.2 shows the block
natural gas. But the price of natural gas is increasing for diagram of the solar powered conduction cooking system.
depletion of its reserves [1]. Most power plants are running
by this fuel and it is going to face a great scarcity. Natural
wood, charcoal and other agricultural and animal wastes are
used in rural areas for household cooking [2]. Incomplete
combustion of those fuels releases small particles and other
constituents which cause health hazards. More than 45,000
women and children die each year in Bangladesh and
millions more suffer from respiratory diseases,
tuberculosis, asthma, cardiovascular disease, eye problems,
and lung cancer due to this kind of smoke and pollution [3]. Figure 2. Block diagram of solar powered conduction cooking system.
To collect natural wood, people are cutting down trees
resulting in deforestation with high global warming. To A good solar irradiation can provide power round the
improve the quality of living, people of the rural area of day for cooking by a conduction heater. A controller could
Bangladesh tend to use LPG (Liquid Petroleum Gas) or be used to control the heat to ensure proper cooking. The

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heat which is produced by I2R loss of conduction coil and Iout got a stable position whereas Vout= 250 V and
provides the energy for cooking. By PSIM simulation initial Iout= 2 A. Therefore the output power, Pout = Vout* Iout =
design was created. Finally, practical implementation was 250 V* 2 A = 500 W. This will release the maximum heat
completed after the proper analysis through PROTEUS for cooking in maximum speed. This heat can be controlled
software. Here, Thin Film solar panels are installed and the by controlling the frequency which, in turn, can be
buck converter topology is implemented as a controller. controlled by integrating logic to control the duty cycle.
Single looped coil conduction cooker of 600 Watt is used for Fig.5 shows the output power for various duty cycles.
cooking. Minimum output power is seen to be at 10% and maximum
at 70% duty cycle. Though this output power mainly
II. SIMULATION AND PERFORMACE ANALYSIS depends on sun light or solar irradiations, but the graph is
The solar powered conduction cooker will be made up of shown based on peak irradiation (1000 W/m2).
a 1KW thin film solar PV modules, a controller and a
conduction cooker. Brief analysis based on software
simulation are given below.
A. Design and Analysis in PSIM
A 1 kilowatt capacity system is designed in PSIM. Solar
panel used as input power are thin film solar panels. 2
branches of parallel 10 panels (each 5 in series) are
combined to get system input voltage of 250 Vdc. Buck
converter is designed by using the combination of MOSFET,
inductor (3mH), capacitor (100uF) and diode. Highest
switching frequency is 20kHz that can be controlled by a
potentiometer. Resistance of the conduction cooker is
optimized as 122 Ohm and used here as output. The Figure 5. Output power vs. duty cycle.
schematic diagram is shown in Fig. 3. B. Proteus Simulation
Before practical implementation, precise values of the
components are required. PROTEUS design of the
synchronous buck converter is shown in Fig.6.

Figure 3. Schematic diagram of cooking system.

VLoad

250

200

150

100

50

Iload

1.5

0.5

0 0.1 0.2 0.3 0.4

Time (s)

Figure 4. Output voltage and current of the controller. Figure 6. Design in PROTEUS software.

By using 70 % duty cycle, highest output power is drawn
with the switching frequency of 20 kHz and given solar
irradiation of 1000 W/m2 with 250C temperature. The
corresponding output voltage (Vout) and output current (Iout)
is shown in Fig. 4. After a very small rising time, both Vout
Initially, 20 kHz PWM signal is generated by using
microcontroller (PIC 16f685 used in the control circuit). The
duty cycle of this PWM is controlled by a reference input
voltage into the micro controller. A voltage divider circuit is
then used to obtain the reference in the PIC microcontroller

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to generate PWM signals and to control its duty cycle. For Panels are inclined from the ground at an angle of 15 o. The
various duty cycles the output power measured and matched solar thin film PV array which is installed for this
with the PSIM simulation. A driver (IR2104) is used to drive experiment is shown in Fig. 9.
the high voltage MOSFET (IRF840). At maximum duty
cycle (f=20kHz), the output power is maximum. Fig.7 shows
the output voltage and current (Iout = 2 A and Vout = 247 V)
and Fig. 8 shows the duty cycle. We can also define duty
cycle as D=ton/T the fraction of the period the switch is on
[5].

Figure 9. Solar PV array of 1 KW capacity.

B. Controller
Figure 7. Outputs from PROTEUS. To ensure a perfect dish, we have to utilize the energy as
well as heat in a proper way. Different foods require
different heats and an attenuation of heat energy is needed
for completing cooking. To control the heat, a converter is
used. A Buck converter is used for this topology. The circuit
below is a buck converter.
C. Conduction Cooker
The specifications of the conduction cooker used are
given in the Table 2.
TABLE II. SPECIFICATIONS OF CONDUCTION COOKER

Specification of Conduction Cooker

Figure 8. Duty cycle of switching frequency.
Ratings 600 W
III. EXPERIMENTAL SETUP Operating Voltage 200~260 V
Equipments required for this system implementation, are Current 2~3 A
described in the following section:
A. 1 KW Solar Array
10 thin film solar panels each of 95 Watt were installed.
PV module specifications are described in Table 1.
TABLE I. SPECIFICATIONS OF THIN FILM MODULE

Parameters Specifications
Open Circuit Voltage (Voc) 71V
Short Circuit Current (Isc) 2.25A
Voltage at Maximum Power 53.5V
(Vpm)
Current at Maximum Power 1.78A
(Ipm) Figure 10. Total Experimental setup.
Maximum Power (Pmax) 95W
As the controller is turned on, the DC power from the
panels provide electricity to conduction coil of the cooker
For the experiment, 5 solar panels are connected in series and heats the coil. In direct contact, the heat is transferred
and two such series combinations are connected in parallel. directly from the coil to the utensil as it is placed on the

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cooker. Thus, it conducts almost 76% of its energy directly 02:10 190 1.4 266 Cooking completed!!!
into the pan [6].
The input DC power is obtained from the readings of DC
ammeter and DC voltmeter. This DC input is then fed into
In the water boiling test, since the experiment was done
the controller which subsequently is connected to the
in the morning, and the solar radiation was almost steady.
conduction cooker. Total experimental setup is shown in Fig
This resulted in a non-fluctuating input voltage for the short
10.
time interval. As a result the output voltage was also seen to
IV. EXPERIMENTAL DATA ANALYSIS be constant at 250V for a constant maximum duty cycle of
0.85 of the converter. Thus, the operational efficiency for the
Initially, the conduction cooking system was used to water boiling test at maximum output power of 391W is
boil water and the energy being fed to the cooker is recorded. found to be almost 93%.
It is observed that the water took approximately 25 minutes However, during cooking rice with vegetables, the
to boil completely. As the experimental tests were done experiment was done in late afternoon. So the solar radiation
during the winter season, so the solar radiation was quite fluctuated for a fixed duty cycle of 0.85. Therefore, the
low and the output power was around 50% of the panel. So, output voltage showed lots of fluctuations. But, during the
the power generation from the panels was around 410W. last 20 mins, the duty cycle was reduced to 0.60 for proper
The input power and the water status at regular time cooking of the rice using steam. The operational efficiency
intervals are presented in Table. 3. of this experiment is found to be about 85%.
TABLE III. WATER BOILING STATUS
V. ECONOMIC ANALYSIS
Time Vdc Idc Pdc Water status The economic analysis of the solar powered conduction
(V) (A) (W) cooking system is carried out to assess the cost and also to
11:20 250 1.7 391 25 degrees identify the breakeven point of the system. The cost of
elements of PV-connected conduction cooking system
11:25 250 1.1 165 Very small vapour installation is presented in Fig. 13 and the actual costs
involved in the system installation are provided in Table 5.
11:30 250 1.7 391 Small vapour

11:35 250 1.5 285 Water starts to boil

11:40 250 1.2 192 Water at 98 degrees

11:45 250 1.3 221 Water fully boiled (100

degrees)

It was also used to cook mixed vegetable with rice and

again the energy input along with the duration of cooking
were recorded at regular intervals. The cooking procedure
was initiated at 12.50pm and it took about one hour to
complete the cooking. It is observed that although the initial Figure 11. Pie chart of cost components of the system.
power from the panels was around 400W but the power
dropped during the afternoon. The input power and the TABLE V. COST COMPONENTS OF SOLAR COOKING SYSTEM
status of cooking at regular time intervals are presented in
Table. 4. Equipment BDT
Thin Film Solar Panel (10 50,000
TABLE IV. COOKING STATUS OF MIXED VEGETABLES WITH RICE panels x 95W)
Conduction Cooker 2,000
Time Vdc Idc Wdc Cooking status Controller 5000
(V) (A) (W)
12:50 230 1.7 391 Vegetable added: cooking Mounting & Others 3,000
started
Total 60,000
01:20 150 1.1 165 Vegetable almost cooked

01:30 230 1.7 391 Rice added

The total installation cost for the system is BDT 60,000.
01:40 190 1.5 285 Rice starts to boil The maximum cost is seen to be involved in the solar panels,
which is 82% of the total cost.
01:50 160 1.2 192 Rice almost done
For obtaining the Breakeven Point, the constructed 1KW
02:00 170 1.3 221 Rice almost done solar powered conduction cooker is compared to LPG that is
currently used for gas stoves [7]. It is found that at least two

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cylinders of LPG are required as cooking fuel for a family of
5 members [8].
Cost of fuel/month = 1300 BDT/cylinder x 2 cylinders
= 2600 BDT/month
Cost of fuel/year = 2600 BDT/month x 12
= 31,200 BDT/year
The breakeven point is calculated to identify the number
of years by which the initial cost of the system will be
recovered. The calculation for breakeven point is shown in
Equation 1.
Total price of the conduction cooker
Breakeven Point =
Price of fuel every year
Therefore, the breakeven point of our system is:
60000
= 1.9 years ≈ 2 years
31200
VI. CONCLUSION
A solar powered conduction cooking system has been
designed, implemented and tested for cooking different
foods and boiling water successfully and the performances
have been evaluated.
All simulations show that the solar powered conduction
cooker has a good prospect in both rural and urban areas of a
developing country like Bangladesh. It can fulfil the energy
demand for cooking of 5 member family daily.
This cooking system can be used to meet the cooking
energy requirement in both rural and urban areas. With
possibilities of 2 years of investment money return, this
system can attenuate health hazards and environmental
impact. Over time, advancements in the manufacture of
components will reduce the overall cost of the system and
make the system economically more viable.
REFERENCES
[1] Official website of Bangladesh power development board;
http://www.bpdb.gov.bd
[2] Assessment of Existing Improved Cook Stove in Bangladesh BRAC
Research Report December 2006. www.brac.net/research
[3] “Knowledge of Health Hazards and Perception of Prevention
(1) Amongst Females Exposed to Biomass Fuel and Gas/Electricity Fuel
in A District of Bangladesh”. By MA Alim , ASM Nurunnabi , S
Ahmad. AKMMC J 2013.
[4] Bashar, S. A. (2009). “Solar power as a prime energy source in
Bangladesh”, The Daily Star (thedailystar.net), December 26, 2009.
(http://www.thedailystar.net/newDesign/print_news.php?nid=11924
4) (Accessed on 22/7/2015)
[5] Buck-Boost Interleaved Inverter Configuration for Multiple-Load
Induction Cooking Application. By Sharath Kumar, Vishwanathan.
and Bhagwan K. Murthy
[6] Assessment of Existing Improved Cook Stove in Bangladesh BRAC
Research Report December 2006. www.brac.net/research
[7] Research Report by IDLC: Energy Sector of Bangladesh. Date:
March 15, 2011
[8] Official website of Bangladesh Petroleum Corporation:
http://bpc.gov.bd/contactus.php?id=36
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