Novel differential power processing topology for the mitigation of mismatch in photovoltaic systems

Abstract

Energy harvesting from photovoltaic (PV) strings is significantly affected by partial shading. To address this problem, several power-electronics-based methods have been proposed in the literature. In this context, this letter presents an enhanced differential power processing topology. This novel solution allows obtaining soft switching, as well as the operation at lower switching frequencies, considering good trade-offs between the number of modules of the string and component count. The proposed differential power processing approach is thoroughly analysed and compared with both the traditional bypass diode method and the PV-to-PV architecture through simulations carried out in MATLAB/Simulink environment.