High efficiency MPPT by model predictive control considering load disturbances for photovoltaic applications under dynamic weather condition

Due to variability of solar energy resources, maximum power point tracking (MPPT) of photovoltaic (PV) is required to ensure continuous operation at the maximum power point (MPP) and maximize the energy harvest. Many standards are developed to ensure the safe and efficient power generation under dynamic weather conditions. This paper presents a high efficiency fixed-step model predictive control (MPC) technique to employ the MPPT for photovoltaic applications. The MPP operating point is determined by using perturb and observe (P&O) technique. The proposed fixed-step predictive model based MPPT presents significant advantages in dynamic response and power ripple at steady state. A characteristic of MPC is the use of system models for selecting optimal actuations, thus evaluating the effect of model parameter mismatch on control effectiveness is of interest. In this paper, the load model is eliminated from the proposed MPC formulation by using an observer-based technique. The performance of the proposed observer-based MPC-MPPT is evaluated on the basis of European Efficiency Test, EN 50530 that assesses the performance of PV systems under dynamic environment conditions. The proposed MPC-MPPT technique for a flyback converter is implemented using dSPACE DS1007.