Power maximization in standalone photovoltaic system: an adaptive PSO approach

Abstract

A control strategy for power maximization which is an important mechanism to extract maximum power under changing environmental conditions using Adaptive Particle Swarm Optimization (APSO) is proposed in this paper. An Adaptive Inertia Weighting Factor (AIWF) is utilized in the velocity update equation of traditional PSO for the improvement in speed of convergence and precision in tracking Maximum Power Point (MPP) in standalone Photovoltaic system. Adaptation of weights based on the success rate of particles toward maximum power extraction is the most promising feature of AIWF. The inertia weight is kept constant in traditional PSO for the complete duration of optimization process. The MPPT in PV system poses a dynamic optimization problem and the proposed APSO approach paves way not only to track MPP under uniform irradiation conditions, but also to track MPP under non-uniform irradiation conditions. Simulations are done in MATLAB/Simulink environment to verify the effectiveness of proposed technique in comparison with the existing PSO technique. With change in irradiation and temperature, the APSO technique is found to provide better results in terms of tracking speed and efficiency. Hardware utilizing dSPACE DS1104 controller board is developed in the laboratory to verify the effectiveness of APSO method in real time.