See discussions, stats, and author profiles for this publication at: https://www.researchgate.

net/publication/338075349

Differential Power Processing based Photovoltaic Power Systems: A Review

Conference Paper · August 2019

DOI: 10.1109/ICOCN.2019.8934880

CITATIONS READS
4 244

3 authors, including:

Huiqing Wen Guanying Chu

Xi'an Jiaotong-Liverpool University Xi'an Jiaotong-Liverpool University
239 PUBLICATIONS 3,562 CITATIONS 21 PUBLICATIONS 214 CITATIONS

SEE PROFILE SEE PROFILE

Some of the authors of this publication are also working on these related projects:

Transient control in DAB View project

Solid State Transformer View project

All content following this page was uploaded by Guanying Chu on 09 March 2020.

The user has requested enhancement of the downloaded file.

 2019 18th International Conference on Optical Communications and Networks
Differential Power Processing based Photovoltaic Power Systems: A Review
Huiqing Wen, Chenyang Lin, Guanying Chu
Xi’an Jiaotong-Liverpool University, China
Department of Electrical and Electronic Engineering
Xi’an Jiaotong-Liverpool University (XJTLU), Suzhou, Jiangsu Province, China
Huiqing.Wen@xjtlu.edu.cn
ABSTRACT
The internal and external mismatches experienced on
photovoltaic (PV) cells will reduce the actual output
power. Compared with the full power processing (FPP)
architecture, differential power processing (DPP)
architectures achieve high system reliable and efficiency
by processing a fraction of total power when maintaining
the operation of distributed local maximum power point
(MPP). This paper presents a comprehensive review of
different DPP architectures in terms of the connection,
power converter topologies, and MPPT control. The
conclusion was drawn based on the literature review and
evaluation.
Keywords: Photovoltaic power system, energy, efficiency
I. INTRODUCTION
Due to the benefits of environmental friendly,
renewability, abundant availability, and quickly-dropped
cost, photovoltaic energy has gain popularity world
widely [1-3]. However, the internal and external
mismatches experienced on photovoltaic (PV) cells will
reduce the actual output power [4, 5]. Full power
processing (FPP) structure is a simple structure that has
been widely implemented in early decades. A瀆澳shown in
Fig.1, the FPP converter is called as DC optimizers and
connected in series to form a high output voltage.
Although power extracted to maximum power point
(MPP), any mismatch on internal and external of
substrings experienced would reduce output power.
PV DC-DC
Converter
DC-DC
PV Converter
DC-AC
Inverter
PV DC-DC
Converter
DC-DC
PV Converter
Fig.1 Modular cascaded dc-dc converters.
Recently, Differential Power Processing (DPP)
architectures have investigated [6-10], which can achieve
high efficiency, through processing a fraction of total
power when maintaining distributed local MPP operation.
Recently, there are many researches on the DPP
architecture. In [8], a module integrated converter (MIC)
based on cascaded quasi-Z-source inverters with DPP
capability was presented. In [9], a distributed maximum
power point tracking control scheme for DPP-based
photovoltaic (PV) systems at the submodule level was
presented. Generally, the DPP architecture can be
connected in series or parallel. Fig. 2 shows the
978-1-7281-2764-4/19/$31.00 ©2019 IEEE
classification of the DPP configurations. Basically, the
DPP converter will provide the current different between
PV elements, either module level, sub-module level, or
cells. Thus, the characteristics of DPP architectures can
be specified in terms of the bidirectional or unidirectional,
isolated or non-isolated, module level or cell level,
module to module or string to module sharing. Since
any DPP design option has its own limitations, a
comprehensive comparison and review becomes
important for the practical PV power system design,
which becomes the main objective of this paper.
Differential Power Processing Structure
Parallel connection Cascaded connection Virtual connection Others...
Single ended
structure
W/fronted
converter
Virtual series
structure
Hybrid
structure
structure
Bypass Structure
W/O fronted
Virtual parallel
converter Nested
structure
structure
structure
Element to
element structure
Single Virtual
series converter
for an original PV
string
Bus to element
structure
Fig.2 Classification of the DPP configurations
II. DPP STRUCTURE
Fig. 3 illustrates typical DPP structures, including parallel
connection, virtual series connection, and bypass
structure. Here the submodule level DPP is used as the
example. Table I shows the comparison of different DPP
structures in terms of the voltage gain, the power flow
direction, the control complexity, the constant power
region, and the number of DPP converters.
Among different structures, two popular structures are
named as PV-Bus structure and PV-PV structure. Fig.4
shows the structure of PV to bus and PV to PV. The PV-
PV bus can reduce the number of DPP converter, which
can reduce the cost and hardware size. Bidirectional buck-
boost converter can be used for the DPP converter with
individual MPPT control. The PV-PV structure is highly
coupled so that he controlled must be carefully designed
in order to get the optimal PV string current. However,
when one or few cells or modules are shaded, all DPP
converters must participate the power conversion, which
will increase the power losses. The PV-Bus structure can
solve this problem, which shows higher efficiency. For
instance, a bidirectional flyback converter is used for the
PV-Bus DPP architecture and the measured efficiency is
95.5% [4].
 2019 18th International Conference on Optical Communications and Networks

converter. Thus, the circuit model shown in Fig. 5 will

Submodule I
Submodule I
facilitate the control design in the DPP architecture.

Submodule II Submodule II
Vout
PV2
Vout
IMPP2-IMPP1 IMPP2
Submodule III
IMPP1
Submodule III
澳 澳
(a) (b) Controllable
Current
Source
PV1
Submodule I

Submodule II
Vout Fig.5 Differential power converters act as controllable current
sources to allow series PV elements to operate at independent
current level.
Submodule III
B. MPPT Control for DPP converters
澳 In DPP system, to design a proper control method for
(c) MPPT, two algorithms for commercial micro-inverter,
Fig.3 Typical DMPPT structures: (a) Parallel Connection. (b) including perturbation and observation (P&O) and
Virtual series connection. (c) Bypass structure.
Incremental Conductance method (INC), are presented in
Table.1 Comparisons of DPP structure this section. The principle of P&O is perturbing the output
Parallel Cascaded Virtual
power on a fixed period, led to output power increment or
Solutions Others
connection connection connection decrement, then observed the its output power, justified
Voltage Gain Nearly unit Nearly unit High High the direction of variety that to be basis next step of control
Power Flow bidirectional bidirectional undirectional bidirectional signal variety. Fig.6 shown the control flowchart. DPP
converter adopts the P&O algorithm, which periodical
Complexity Simple Simple Simple High
perturbs the voltage of each own module, observes the
Constant Power
Region
No No No No
variety directions of each element currents, then
Nmin (indicates the
number of PV units)
Npanel-1 Npanel Npanel Npanel-1 calculates the how to change in the PV module output
power, which determine the direction of the next voltage
perturbation. Fig.7 shows the flowchart of Incremental
PV
Conductance method.
PV Start
DC-DC
Measure Ik. Uk
DC-DC
PV DC-AC PV DC-AC
Inverter
Inverter yes
DC-DC Calculate Pk

DC-DC no

PV PV yes no
P(k)>P(k-1)?
DC-DC
澳 yes no no yes

(a) (b) U(k)>U(k-1)? U(k)>U(k-1)?

Fig.4 (a) PV to BUS structure. (b) PV to PV structure

III. DPP COTNROL
Uref=Uref+U Uref=Uref-U Uref=Uref+U Uref=Uref-U

A. Control Model
The basic principle of DPP is that it can enable each PV Fig.6 The flowchart of Perturbation and Observation (P&O)
element work at its optimal state regardless the specific Start

system connection and the string level can provide a small Measure Ik, Uk

difference of the MPP current between two nearby PV

elements. Fig.5 shown the control model of DPP Calculate dI, dU

architecture. Basically, there would be no power no yes

exchange needed if there is no mismatch. DPP converters dU=0?

will extract or inject the mismatching power so that each yes

dI/dU=-I/U? dI=0?
yes

PV element can reach its MPP. As shown in Fig. 5, a no no

controllable limited-rating current source is modelled for dI/dU>-I/U? dI>0?
DPP converters. When mismatches occur on series- yes no yes no

connected PV elements before they reach their MPPs, the Uref=Uref+U Uref=Uref-U Uref=Uref+U Uref=Uref-U

controlled current source will automatically generate the

current difference to grid-connected inverter or AC-
inverter in order to reach the equivalent voltage Fig.7 The flowchart of Incremental Conductance method
equalization. The different power is only proceeded one Beside the true MPPT algorithm, the voltage equalization
time, which reduces the power conversion losses by the with open-loop control can be used for each DPP

978-1-7281-2764-4/19/$31.00 ©2019 IEEE

 2019 18th International Conference on Optical Communications and Networks

converter. The basic concept is illustrated in Fig. 8. IV. CONCLUSION

Through the experimental test, the results are shown in This paper presents a comprehensive review of different
Fig. 8, where the voltage of operating points for each DPP architectures in terms of the connection, power
substring is nearly close to its ideal voltage of MPPs. Thus, converter topologies, and MPPT control. The control
the voltage equalization can be used to simplify the strategies for DPP converters, system level control and
control for DPP converters. The voltage equalization protection are reviewed. Main trade-offs for different
method will keep the voltage in primary and secondary of controls have been discussed.
the BFCs equal. Thus, no additional voltage or current
sensors are required. V. ACKNOWLEDGMENTS
This work was supported by the Research development
fund of XJTLU (RDF-16-01-10, RDF-17-01-28),
Research Enhancement Fund of XJTLU (REF-17-01-02),
the Jiangsu Science and Technology Programme
(BK20161252), and the Suzhou Prospective Application
programme (SYG201723), and the XJTLU Key
Programme Special Fund (KSF-A-08, KSF-E-13).
Fig. 8. Voltage equalization principle [11].
C. System Level Control REFERENCES
[1] Li, X., Wen, H., Hu, Y., & Jiang, L. (2019). A novel beta
The basic principle of the system level control is regulate parameter based fuzzy-logic controller for photovoltaic
the string converter so that the string current reference is MPPT application. Renewable energy, 130, 416-427.
obtained. Then, a PI controller is used to achieve the [2] Li, X., Wen, H., Hu, Y., & Jiang, L. (2019). Drift-free
system minimum power. The controls for DPP converters current sensorless MPPT algorithm in photovoltaic
and system level work independently. Fig. 9 shows the systems. Solar Energy, 177, 118-126.
system level optimal control algorithm. [3] Veerapen, S., Wen, H., Li, X., Du, Y., Yang, Y., Wang, Y.,
Start & Xiao, W. (2019). A novel global maximum power point
Measure Vpvk and Ipvk for PV modules,
tracking algorithm for photovoltaic system with variable
for k = 1 to 2 perturbation frequency and zero oscillation. Solar Energy,
Calculate DPP Converters Current 181, 345-356.
Idppk = ̮Ipvk- Istring̮
[4] Chu, G., Wen, H., Yang, Y., & Wang, Y. (2019).
Calculate Each DPP Converter Power
Processed Elimination of Photovoltaic Mismatching with Improved
Pdppk = Vpvk · Idppk
Submodule Differential Power Processing. IEEE
Calculate Total Power Processed
Pdppt = ě̮Pdppk̮ Transactions on Industrial Electronics.
Calculate The Present and Previous
[5] Udenze, P., Hu, Y., Wen, H., Ye, X., & Ni, K. (2018). A
Power and String Current Differences
ƸPdppt and ƸIstri ng
Reconfiguration Method for Extracting Maximum Power
from Non-Uniform Aging Solar Panels. Energies, 11(10),
If
Y ƸPdppt > 0 N 2743.
Iref = Istring - ƸIstring Iref = Istring + ƸIstring [6] Jeon, Y. T., & Park, J. H. (2019). Unit-Minimum Least
Power Point Tracking for the Optimization of Photovoltaic
Update Reference Current as next
input of Istring
Differential Power Processing Systems. IEEE
Transactions on Power Electronics, 34(1), 311-324.
PI Controller Controls The String
Converter Duty-cycle [7] Jeong, H., Lee, H., Liu, Y. C., & Kim, K. A. (2019). Review
of Differential Power Processing Converter Techniques for
Fig. 9. System level optimal control algorithm. Photovoltaic Applications. IEEE Transactions on Energy
D. System Level Protection Conversion, 34(1), 351-360.
The protection is important to ensure the proper operation [8] Uno, M., & Shinohara, T. (2019). Module-Integrated
of DPP converters. Fig. 10 shows the protection Converter Based on Cascaded Quasi-Z-Source Inverter
algorithm. When the monitored power of each DPP with Differential Power Processing Capability for
Photovoltaic Panels Under Partial Shading. IEEE
converter is larger than the set rating value, the sub-
Transactions on Power Electronics.
module integrated converter (subMIC) needs to be [9] Bell, R., & Pilawa-Podgurski, R. C. (2015). Decoupled and
protected by turning off the active devices of the subMIC. distributed maximum power point tracking of series-
Start
connected photovoltaic submodules using differential
power processing. IEEE Journal of Emerging and Selected
Measure
P1=|U1*I1|
Q1!=Pulse2 &
Q2!=Pulse2 & No Topics in Power Electronics, 3(4), 881-891.
Q3!=Pulse2
P2=|U2*I2|
P3=|U3*I3| [10] Shenoy, P. S., Kim, K. A., Johnson, B. B., & Krein, P. T.
Yes
Set
(2012). Differential power processing for increased energy
Flag=Pulse1
P1<Prated
No
P2<Prated
No
P3<Prated
No production and reliability of photovoltaic systems. IEEE
Yes Yes Yes
Transactions on Power Electronics, 28(6), 2968-2979.
No
Flag==0.5 Q1=Pulse1 Q2=Pulse1 Q3=Pulse1 [11] Chu, G., Wen, H., Jiang, L., Hu, Y., & Li, X. (2017).
Bidirectional flyback based isolated-port submodule
Q4=1-Q1 Q5=1-Q1 Q6=1-Q1

Yes
Q1=Q2=Q3=Pulse1 Q1=
Q4=Pulse2
Q2=
Q5=Pulse2
Q3=
Q6=Pulse2
differential power processing optimizer for photovoltaic
Q4=Q5=Q6=1-Q1
applications. Solar Energy, 158, 929-940.
Fig. 10. System protection algorithm.

978-1-7281-2764-4/19/$31.00 ©2019 IEEE

View publication stats