Solar Charge Controllers and their Implementation

Abstract

Abstract Solar energy is the incident energy from the Sun. The main components of this energy are incident light energy and the heat contained in it. The extraction of solar energy may be active or passive. Due to abundance and availability, solar energy is the most attractive alternate in available renewable resources. In the 21st century solar energy is expected to become increasingly attractive as a renewable energy source because of its inexhaustible supply and its nonpolluting character, in stark contrast to the finite fossil fuels coal, petroleum, and natural gas. Solar energy is a renewable, abundant and nonpolluting energy source. In order to use solar energy for electric applications, charge controllers are required to regulate the input to the circuit. Various methods of charge control include stage 1 and 2 control, pulse width modulation (PWM) and maximum power point tracking (MPPT) control. Commercial implementation involves PWM or MPPT. This paper aims to review various methods of charge control and their effective comparison in terms of cost and efficiency. Keywords : Battery, charge controller, MPPT, photovoltaic cell, PWM, stage-1,2 Cite this Article: Nishtha Verma, Siddharth Goyal, Sanchita Gupta, Sandeep Banerjee. Solar Charge Controllers and their Implementation. Journal of Microcontroller Engineering and Applications . 2020; 7(1): 12–15p.