Voltage Regulation of Photovoltaic Arrays: Small-Signal Analysis and Control Design
Voltage Regulation of Photovoltaic Arrays: Small-Signal Analysis and Control Design
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ISSN 1755-4535
Abstract: This study deals with the regulation of the output voltage of photovoltaic (PV) arrays. As a case study,
the DC – DC buck converter is used as an interface between the PV array and the load, but other types of
converters can be used for the same purpose. The input voltage of the converter is controlled in order to
regulate the operating point of the array. Besides reducing losses and stress because of the bandwidth-limited
regulation of the converter duty cycle, controlling the converter input voltage reduces the settling time and
avoids oscillation and overshoot, making easier the functioning of maximum power point tracking (MPPT)
methods. The voltage regulation problem is addressed with a detailed analysis that starts with the modelling
of the PV array and the converter. This analysis is followed by study, design, simulation and practical
experiments of three closed-loop control strategies for the buck converter. Control stability and
implementation considerations are presented.
Converters with the maximum power point tracking This paper addresses the control problem illustrated in Fig. 1.
(MPPT) feature use an algorithm to continuously detect The PV array feeds the DC–DC buck converter. The output of
the maximum instantaneous power of the PV array. As the the converter is represented by a constant DC voltage source Vo
operating conditions of the array (solar irradiation and that represents a battery or a DC link for another cascaded
temperature) may change randomly during the operation of converter. The buck converter serves as an interface between
the system, an MPPT algorithm is necessary so that the the PV array and the voltage Vo . The MPPT block (not
maximum instantaneous power can be extracted and studied in this paper) provides a voltage reference and the
delivered to the load. voltage controller regulates the PV array voltage.
Many MPPT methods have been proposed in the Some works in the literature present PV systems with the
literature. Many theoretical improvements and even direct duty cycle control of the DC – DC converter [2 – 4],
advanced techniques of artificial intelligence have been where the MPPT block directly actuates on the converter
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I0 9.825 × 1028 A
Ipv 8.214 A
a 1.3
Rp 415.405 V
Rs 0.221 V
Veq 50.9007 V
Figure 2 Non-linear i × v characteristic of the KC200GT
Req 3.2327 V
solar array and equivalent linear model at the MPP
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other operating points. The operation in the current source Finally, the following equation relates the input voltage of
region of the i × v curve (see Fig. 2) presents the worst the converter and the capacitor voltage
and most critical dynamic behaviour [1, 10]. In a later
section, several closed-loop configurations will be analysed d
and they will be evaluated in all regions of the i × v curve. pv = RC
v +v
v C (8)
dt C
Table 1 lists the parameters of the KC200GT array
obtained through modelling [8, 9]. 3.2 Small-signal model for
voltage control
3 Converter modelling The objective of modelling the converter for voltage control is
to obtain a small-signal transfer function that relates the
In this section, small-signal models of the buck converter fed ′
small-signal voltage v̂pv and the control variable d̂ = −d̂ .
by the PV array are developed. The method of average The minus signal is necessary because negative variations of
variables [11 – 14] is used to obtain small-signal converter duty cycle cause positive increments in the input voltage.
transfer functions. The first and second models describe the
behaviour of vpv and iL with respect to the duty cycle The modelling process is essentially composed of three
of the converter. The third model describes the behaviour steps: inserting the small-signal variables in the state
of vpv with respect to iL . equations, applying the Laplace transformation and
manipulating the equations in order to find the desired
3.1 Average state equations transfer function.
Fig. 4 shows the PV-buck system with average voltages and The small-signal variables are introduced with the following
, i) means the
currents. The bar over a variable name (e.g. v definitions
discrete-time average value of the variable within one
switching period of the converter. By writing the circuit
equations with average variables, the high-frequency C = VC + v̂C
v
components are eliminated and only the natural system pv = Vpv + v̂pv
v
behaviour remains. (9)
i L = IL + î L
The average capacitor state equation is d = D − d̂
Veq − v
pv d
−C − i 1 = 0
v (4) where DC steady state values are capitalised and small signals
Req dt C
are marked with a hat.
The average inductor state equation is By substituting (7) and (8) in (4) and then replacing the
average variables by the definitions of (9) one finds
d
34 − RLi L − Vo − L
v i =0 (5)
dt L
IL d̂ + d̂ î L + VC /Req + Veq /Req − v̂C /Req − IL D −
The circuit constituting the transistor and diode may be d d
replaced by the average equivalent quadripole with − î L D − C v̂ − RC C/Req v̂C = 0 (10)
dt C dt
terminals 1 –2 – 3 – 4, which is described by the following
equations, where d is the duty cycle of the transistor From (10), by neglecting the non-linear product d̂ î L and
applying the Laplace transformation, the small-signal
34 = v
v 12 d = v
pv d (6) equation is obtained
i 1 = i 3 d = i L d (7)
IL d̂ (s) − v̂C (s)/Req −
Figure 4 Buck converter with PV array linear model From (11), (12) and (8) one gets the voltage to duty cycle
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doi: 10.1049/iet-pel.2008.0344 & The Institution of Engineering and Technology 2010
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transfer function
′
Gvd (s) = v̂pv /d̂ (s)
(1 + sCRC )(IL + (VD(1 − sCRC ))/(RL + sL))
=
sC + (1 + sCRC )((1/Req ) + (D2 /(RL + sL)))
(13)
3.3 Small-signal model for current control Figure 5 Equivalent average circuit used to obtain Gvi(s)
The objective of modelling the converter for current control is to
obtain a small-signal transfer function that relates the buck obtain a very useful transfer function for v̂pv . The influence
converter inductor current iL and the converter duty cycle. of d̂ on the system is already embedded in the î L (s)/d̂ (s)
One must notice that in this case, unlike the voltage transfer transfer function and the system is analysed near the
function previously obtained, the control variable is d̂ because operating point corresponding to the steady-state duty cycle
positive duty cycle increments cause positive current increments. D, so one can make i 1 = i L D as shown in the circuit of Fig. 5.
The modelling process has the same steps used in the Veq − v
pv d
−C − i L D = 0
v (16)
previous section, so the development of the inductor Req dt C
current transfer function will not be presented in detail. For
the current control, the following definitions are used By using (8) and (16) with the following small-signal
definitions
C = VC + _
v vC
pv = Vpv + v̂pv
v C = VC + _
v vC
i L = IL + î L (14) pv = Vpv + v̂pv
v
i L = IL − î L (17)
_
d =D+d
_
d =D+d
From the average state equations (4) and (5), with (8) and
(14), the following current to duty cycle transfer function is the desired transfer function is found
obtained
v̂pv (s) D(1 + sCRC )Req
Gid (s) Gvi (s) = ′ = (18)
î L (s) 1 + sCRC + sCRC Req
= î L (s)/d̂ (s)
IL D
= − V (1 + sCRC )/ 4 Open-loop analysis
sC(1 + (RC /Req )) + (1/Req )
With the converter transfer functions Gvd (s), Gid (s) and
D2 (1 + sCRC ) Gvi (s), one can make some analyses of the PV-buck system
−RL − sL − (15)
sC(1 + (RC /Req )) + (1/Req ) that help understand the effects of RL and RC in the
system. Before these analyses are done, the transfer
3.4 Small-signal model for voltage and functions are validated by comparison with the responses of
current control a simulated switching converter built with the parameters
of Tables 1 and 2.
The objective of modelling the converter for voltage and
current control is to obtain a transfer function that relates
the input voltage v̂pv to the inductor current î L .
4.1 Validation of transfer functions
This transfer function will be used in the double-loop Figs. 6 – 8 show simulation results of the buck converter and
control scheme presented later, where both the current and the transfer functions. The converter switching frequency is
the voltage of the converter are controlled. In this scheme, 20 kHz and the circuit was evaluated with the PSIM
the control variable of î L is the duty cycle d̂ and the control simulator. The responses of the switching converter are
′
variable of v̂pv is î L = −î L . superimposed with the transfer function responses so that
one can verify the validity of the small-signal modelling in
′
The v̂pv (s)/î L (s) transfer function is obtained by the time domain. The responses match almost perfectly
assuming that small duty cycle perturbations directly affect and the results are reasonably good considering the
the current î L and the dynamics of v̂C is dictated by î L . In simplifications and assumptions made in the mathematical
this way, v̂C is decoupled from d̂ and this permits to easily modelling.
872 IET Power Electron., 2010, Vol. 3, Iss. 6, pp. 869– 880
& The Institution of Engineering and Technology 2010 doi: 10.1049/iet-pel.2008.0344
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L 2 mH
RL 0.1 V
C 3000 mF
RC 0.05 V
Vo 13.15 V
D 0.5
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Figure 16 Bode plots of the open-loop system Gvd(s) and 5.2.2 Voltage control loop: Fig. 22 shows the control
the compensated system Cvd(s)HvGvd(s) scheme employing an inner current control loop and an
external voltage loop. The closed-loop current controller
transfer function is
highlighted in Fig. 16. This warranties good phase margin
even when the PV array operates at points other than the
point at which the i × v curve was linearised. Fig. 17 Cid (s)Gid (s)
Gicl (s) = (19)
shows an experimental result of the converter with the 1 + Cid (s)Gid (s)Hi
single-loop voltage controller.
With the transfer functions Gicl (s) and Gvi (s) from (19)
and (15), the compensator Cvi (s) may be designed in order
5.2 Double feedback loop to control the input voltage vpv .
voltage controller
In the double-loop scheme of Fig. 18, the converter inductor
current is directly controlled and the input voltage is
indirectly regulated. The voltage controller generates a
current reference for the current controller and the current
controller actuates on the converter duty cycle and regulates
the inductor current. Figure 19 Current controller
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Figure 20 Bode plots of the open-loop transfer function Figure 23 Voltage control with inner current loop: Bode
Gid(s) and the compensated system Cid(s)HiGid(s) plots of the uncompensated and compensated loop
transfer functions
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so ik can be rewritten as
Ts T 1 Kp
ik = ek + s ek−1 + yk−1 − ek−1 (24)
2 2 Ki Ki
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& The Institution of Engineering and Technology 2010 doi: 10.1049/iet-pel.2008.0344
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8 References
[1] XIAO W., DUNFORD W.G., PALMER P.R., CAPEL A.: ‘Regulation of
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[2] FEMIA N., PETRONE G., SPAGNUOLO G., VITELLI M.: ‘Optimizing
duty-cycle perturbation of P&O MPPT technique’. Power
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[3] FEMIA N., PETRONE G., SPAGNUOLO G., VITELLI M.: ‘Optimizing
sampling rate of P&O MPPT technique’. Power Electronics
Specialists Conf., 2004, PESC 04, 2004 IEEE 35th Annual,
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Figure 30 Double-loop voltage control: Bode plots
[4] KOUTROULIS E., KALAITZAKIS K., VOULGARIS N.C.: ‘Development
of the closed-loop system compensated with Cvi (s)
of a microcontroller-based, photovoltaic maximum power
in three different operating points of the PV array i × v
point tracking control system’, IEEE Trans. Power
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[13] MIDDLEBROOK R.D., CUK S.: ‘A general unified approach to voltage MPPT’. Power and Energy Engineering Conf.,
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[15] ZHIHAO Y. , XIAOBO W.: ‘Compensation loop design [17] OPPENHEIM A.V., SCHAFER R.W.: ‘Discrete-time signal
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880 IET Power Electron., 2010, Vol. 3, Iss. 6, pp. 869– 880
& The Institution of Engineering and Technology 2010 doi: 10.1049/iet-pel.2008.0344