Publicação
Adaptable Power Electronics for Solar Chargers
| Resumo: | Solar energy is a free and ubiquitous resource that reaches Earth in the form of electro- magnetic waves. Despite being one of the most promising renewable resources there’s still plenty of room for growth when it comes to application opportunities. This dissertation aims to improve accessibility for the average consumer to the ap- plications available from solar energy by designing a Maximum Power Point Tracking (MPPT) controller that, by using a perturb and observe algorithm, it is able to reach the maximum power point and maintain it. The circuit is designed to reduce the voltage com- ing from a 10W solar panel (through a buck converter) to 3.7 V in order to charge a Li-Ion battery. After the Li-Ion battery, the voltage is stepped-up (through a boost converter) to the most commercially used voltages: 5, 12 and 20 V, allowing multiple devices to be charged simultaneously with a single circuit, taking advantage from the widely available sunlight. Hence, the goal is to achieve a continuous flow of current and voltage in which the battery is able to provide energy to various applications whilst being charged by a solar panel. All of this should be done while maintaining the controller cheap, portable and efficient, with components that are widely available to everyone. The process con- sisted in designing and testing the two previously mentioned circuits, the buck and the boost converter, with both sunlight and a sun simulator (AM1.5 illumination conditions), and extract the results to compare them and choose the optimal working conditions. The results obtained showed that both circuits were working as intended, with buck generally being able to maintain the maximum power point at all tested frequencies and light intensities with 60% to 80% efficiency. Moreover, tests with the Sun resulted in better results, with higher power extraction and efficiencies. It was also observed that smaller frequencies present higher efficiencies. |
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| Autores principais: | Antão, João Miguel Castilho de Carvalho |
| Assunto: | Solar energy MPPT Li-Ion Buck converter Boost converter Perturb and observe |
| Ano: | 2022 |
| País: | Portugal |
| Tipo de documento: | dissertação de mestrado |
| Tipo de acesso: | acesso aberto |
| Instituição associada: | Universidade Nova de Lisboa |
| Idioma: | inglês |
| Origem: | Repositório Institucional da UNL |
| Resumo: | Solar energy is a free and ubiquitous resource that reaches Earth in the form of electro- magnetic waves. Despite being one of the most promising renewable resources there’s still plenty of room for growth when it comes to application opportunities. This dissertation aims to improve accessibility for the average consumer to the ap- plications available from solar energy by designing a Maximum Power Point Tracking (MPPT) controller that, by using a perturb and observe algorithm, it is able to reach the maximum power point and maintain it. The circuit is designed to reduce the voltage com- ing from a 10W solar panel (through a buck converter) to 3.7 V in order to charge a Li-Ion battery. After the Li-Ion battery, the voltage is stepped-up (through a boost converter) to the most commercially used voltages: 5, 12 and 20 V, allowing multiple devices to be charged simultaneously with a single circuit, taking advantage from the widely available sunlight. Hence, the goal is to achieve a continuous flow of current and voltage in which the battery is able to provide energy to various applications whilst being charged by a solar panel. All of this should be done while maintaining the controller cheap, portable and efficient, with components that are widely available to everyone. The process con- sisted in designing and testing the two previously mentioned circuits, the buck and the boost converter, with both sunlight and a sun simulator (AM1.5 illumination conditions), and extract the results to compare them and choose the optimal working conditions. The results obtained showed that both circuits were working as intended, with buck generally being able to maintain the maximum power point at all tested frequencies and light intensities with 60% to 80% efficiency. Moreover, tests with the Sun resulted in better results, with higher power extraction and efficiencies. It was also observed that smaller frequencies present higher efficiencies. |
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