2010 7th International Multi-Conference on Systems, Signals and Devices

Modeling and simulation of a gird connected PV generation

system With MPPT fuzzy logic control
l
2
l
F.Bouchafaa , D.Beriber , M.S.Boucherit
I Laboratory

of Instrumentation, Faculty of Electronics and Computer, University of Sciences and Technology

Houari Boumediene, BP 32 E/-Alia 16111 Bab-Ezzouar Algiers, Algeria.

Laboratoire de commande des processus. Departement Genie Electrique et Informatique.

Ecole Nationale Polytechnique d'Alger-10, rue Hassen Badi, El Harrach, Alger BP182, ALGERIA

Email: fbouchafa@gmai1.com.dberiber@yahoo.fr.ms_Boucherit@yahoo.fr.
Abstracts

This paper presents a simulation model of the electric part of a grid connected photovoltaic generation system. The
model contains a detailed representation of the main components of the system that are the solar array, and the grid
side inverter multilevel inverter Neutral Point Clamped (NPC) VSI. In order to extract the maximum amount of from
the photovoltaic generator, we propose an intelligent control method for the maximum power point tracking (MPPT)
of a photovoltaic system under variable temperature and insulation conditions. This method uses a fuzzy logic
controller. As part of our work, we will focus on voltage inverter at three levels to NPC structure. The latter can
increase the voltage supplied to the load (network) through their topology. Thus, they can generate more voltage
sinusoidal possible and improve the total harmonic distortion through the high voltage levels provided by the
structure of this new converter.
The grid interface inverter transfers the energy drawn from the PV module into the grid by keeping common dc
voltage constant. The PQ control approach has been presented for the multilevel inverter. The simulation results
under MatlablSimulink show the control performance and dynamic behaviour of grid connected photovoltaic system.
Keywords: PV, MPPT, fuzzy logic control , NPC inverter, clamping bridge, enslavement, gird.

1. INTRODUCTION
In recent years, the efforts to spread the use of
renewable energy resources instead of pollutant fossil
fuels and other forms have increased.
Photovoltaic systems are increasing in size as they
become more affordable and supporting schemes start to
include larger installations. In a near future,
photovoltaic systems are going to be very common, and
it is expected that they will contribute with a significant
share to power generation.
One of the most common control strategies structures
applied to decentralized power generator is based on
Power direct control employing a controller for the dc
link voltage and a controller to regulate the injected
current to the utility network. The system components
and power control scheme were modelled in terms of
dynamic behaviours. The proposed models were
implemented in Matlab/Simulink. This paper describes

978-1-4244-7534-6/10/$26.00 2010 IEEE

the dynamic performance of the PV generator connected

through inverters to distribution network under standard
2
climatic conditions (1OOOW1m and 25C).
As part of our work, we will focus on voltage inverter at
three levels to NPC structure. The latter can increase the
voltage supplied to the load through their topology.
Thus, they can generate more voltage sinusoidal
possible and improve the total harmonic distortion
through the high voltage levels provided by the structure
of this new converter.

2. SYSTEM CONFIGURATION
Fig. 1 shows the configuration of the grid-connected PV
system, which consists of solar cell array and the three
phase multilevel inverter NPC VSI. The control
structure of the grid-connected PV system is composed
of two structure control:
1. The MPPT Control, which main feature is to extract
the maximum power from the PV generator.

2010 7th International Multi-Conference on Systems, Signals and Devices

ipv:
I
I

Fig I. General diagram of grid connected photovoltaic system

2. The inverter control, which has the main goals:

- Control the active and regulate the reactive power
injected into the grid;
- Control the DC bus voltage;
- Ensure high quality of the injected power;

3. ELECTRICAL MODEL OF
PHOTOVOLTAIC CELL

To find the model of the photovoltaic generator, we

must first find the electrical equivalent to that source.
Many mathematical models have been developed to
represent their highly nonlinearity resulting from that of
semiconductor junctions that are the basis of their
achievements. Found in the literature several models of
different photovoltaic generators them through the
procedure and the number of parameters involved in the
calculation of voltage and current end-of photovoltaic
generator. We will present our work in the model with
two diodes; in fact this model takes into account the
different internal resistance of the PV cell (Fig.2) [1].

The current generated by the module is given by the

following equation:

--

I -Iph IS].

It consists of a current source iph that models the

conversion of light energy flow, electrical resistance Rp
shunt is a consequence of leaks by the side effect on the
photovoltaic cell, a series resistance R,;, representing the
various resistance contact and connection and two
diodes 01 and D2 in parallel model the PN junction [2].

J-IS2

V+R,I
q(V+R,I)
I
A,.
KT
D
_''1'

. eXJl

From equation (1) we notice that the output current of

the PV module depends on the photocurrent itself,
which itself depends on the solar insulation and the
junction temperature of the cells of the module,
consequently the power which a module can deliver
depends on the solar insulation and the temperature of
the junction. The characteristics of a PV cell of changes
in current and power based on the voltage of the PV cell
is shown in figure 3.

Model of a ohotovoltaic cell with two diodes

q(V+R,I)
A] . K T

eXJl

Where V and I represent the output voltage and current

of the PV, respectively; Rs the series parasitic resistance
of a solar array and Rsh its shunt parasitic resistance; q is
the electronic charge; Iph corresponds to the light
generated current of the solar array. ISb2 represent the
current saturation of the two diodes ; AJ,2 is ideality
factor of the junction of 01 and D2, K the Boltzmann's
constant, T the cell temperature.

Fig.2.

(I)

1.5
I

,
,
.
r ---------- t ---------- t ------
.
..

.
,
I
I
---------- ---------- T------------------ ,, ---

----------

"

-----

------------------------ -------------------

.
.
"
- T---------- T ---------- , -----,
I
I
I
I
.
_______ __________ __________ ________
I
,
I
,
,
I
,
I

-- - -- - -- - -r - -- - -- - I
I

__________ _

,
___ --------_---------_-------_-----------I

Fig.3.

Power and current voltage characteristics

10

2010 7th International Multi-Conference on Systems, Signals and Devices

Table 1: Fuzzy rule table

4. FUZZY LOGIC MPPT TRACKING

CONTROLLER

NB

NS

NS

ZE

ZE

NB

The maximum power that can be delivered by a PV

panel depends greatly on the insulation level and the
operating temperature. Therefore, it is necessary to track
the maximum power point all the time. Recently fuzzy
logic controllers have been introduced in the tracking of
the MPP in PV systems (Fig.4). They have the
advantage to be robust and relatively simple to design as
they do not require the knowledge of the exact model.
They do require on the other hand the complete
knowledge of the operation of the PV system by the
designer.
The two FLC input variables are the error E and change

ZE
PS

ZE
PS

NS

NB

PB
NB

NS

PB

PB

PB

ZE

ZE

ZE

NS

NB

ZE

ZE

PS

PS

NS

NS

NB

EX&n

PB

PS

ZE

ZE

ZE

PS

ZE

ZE

PB

PS

0.CiJl1

0.0l.6

.o.OOB

(a)
0

OC16

0.00$

I
0_OJ2

CE

ce

SCE

CE

Fig. 4: General diagram of a fu zzy

of error CE at sampled times k defined by[3]:

P(k)- P(k -1)

V(k)-V(k-I)
CE (k) E(k)- E(k -I)
E(k)

==

( 2)

==

==

..a.ou;

-0.008

o.oos

Fig.S . Membership for inputs

Where P(k) is the instantaneous power of the

photovoltaic generator.
The input E(k) shows if the load operation point at the
instant k is located on the left or on the right of the
maximum power point on the PV characteristic, while
the input CE(k) expresses the moving direction of this
point.
The fuzzy inference is carried out by using Mamdani's
method, (Table 1), and the defuzzification uses the
centre of gravity to compute the output of this FLC
which is the duty cycle:

I (daJ-daj
da jl
IIl(daJ
jl

-0.032.

(3)

Where ex is duty cycle

the associated fuzzy sets involved in the fuzzy control
rules are defined as: NB: Negative big; NS: Negative
small; ZE: Zero; PS: Positive small PM; PB: Positive
big.
The control rules are indicated in Table 1 with E and
CE as inputs and dex as the output.
These two variables and the control action ex for the
tracking of the maximum power point are illustrated in
figure 5 [4].

0.032

0.016

and outputs

Obviously, it can be deduced that the fuzzy controller is

fast controller in the transitional state and presents also
a much smoother signal with less fluctuations in steady
state.
A fast and steady fuzzy logic MPPT controller was
obtained. It makes it possible indeed to find the point of
maximum power in a shorter time runs (Fig.6).
-

50
40
30
20
10

- - - - - - - - - ----1-----l- - - - j - -- --- ----1--- ;- - - - - ---- - - - - - - - - - - - - --- -- - - - - - - - - -: - - - - - - - -1- - - - - r ---1 -- - - - - - - - - - - - - j -----l- - -- -- --- ----l-- - - -1.
.
j
- - - - -l- - - - + ---- ; - - - + - - - - i - - - - -1- - - - - t - - - - -1- - - - - t - --- - - - - - - - - - - - j -- - - - - - - - j - - - - -- - - - - --- --1-- - - - f - --- - - _

_ -

2
4
6
8
10
12
14
16
18
20'v (v:>
Fig.6. PV charact eristic MPPT under standard climatic conditions.
0

5. MODELING AND CONTROL OF THE

THREE LEVEL NPC VSI

The three-level NPC VSI, presented in figure 1, is one

of the most commonly applied multilevel topologies
[5].This type of VSI has several advantages over the
standard two-level VSI, such as a greater number of
levels in the output voltage waveforms, lower dV/dt,
less harmonic distortion and lower switching
frequencies. The main draw-back of this type of

2010 7th International Multi-Conference on Systems, Signals and Devices

converter is the voltage imbalance produced in the

capacitors of the DC-link when one of the phases is
connected to the middle point or Neutral Point (NP).
Each of three legs of the converter consists of four
power switches, four freewheeling diodes and two
clamping diodes that limit the voltage excursions across
each device to half the input dc-bus voltage [6].

To remedy to the problem of the instability of the output

DC voltage of the photovoltaic cell, we propose to use a
clamping bridge of the input DC voltages of multilevel
inverter constituted by a transistor and a resistor in
series connected in parallel of capacitor.

5.1 Knowledge and Control model of a

three-level NPC VSI

In order to deduce the knowledge model of the inverter,

we introduce the connection function Sis of the switch
which describes the state of every switch (1=c1osed,
O=opened). In this function i is the number of the of the
commutation cell, iE {I ,2,3} s: is the number of the
semi-conductor.
The output voltages of the inverter relatively to the
middle point M with using the connection functions of
the half-arm S 1 , So) are defined as follows

0.8

0.8
0.6

0.6

m=12

OA

OA
0.2

0.2

(4)

m=27

Fig.? The digital strategy of the three-level NPC VSl

In this part, the model of intermediate filter with

clamping bridge is defined by following equation
In order to develop a control model of this inverter, we
define the average model of the knowledge one. Thus,
we define the generating function:

dU cl
C 1 -cIt = I pv

/
) 1 r(k+l)T,
U (t)dt
\ug(t) = -J!
T kT,

dU
C 2 t
d

Te--70

,kE

(5)

The control model of the three phases three-level NPC

VSI, deduced from the system (4), is given by the
following equation where <VA>,<V8> and <Vc>
represent the mean value of the instantaneous ones.
(6)

Figure 7 represents the simple output voltage of the

three-level NPC VSI controlled by the proposed digital
strategy with two bipolar carriers.
We notice that, for even values of m, the simple output
voltage has symmetry relatively to the quarter of the
period, and we have only odd harmonics. But for odd
values of m, we have no symmetry, and then even and
odd harmonics exist. The voltage harmonics gather by
families centred around frequencies multiple of 2mf.

6. DC LINK AND POWER CONTROL

,2

I pv

-. -

I"

l d1

1d2

(7)

I ,2

In this part, the intermediate filter with clamping bridge

is controlled by following algorithm:

Ue> -Ueer = E,
si

E, >0

ana

Ti=l

=>

si

E, <0

on a

Ti='0

=>

lri='Ti.Uei
Rei
Iri='0

(8)

Avec iE {1,2}
In order to maintain multi DC bus link voltage Ue,
respective of reference Ueref and load variations, we
propose to enslave it using fuzzy logic control to
stabilize the multi DC bus link voltage controller [7].
In Park frame the network model, is given by the
following relation:

(9)
Where 0) is the angular frequency of the three-phase
voltage, Vdneb Vd, id and Vqneb Vq, iq are the components
of Vnet and inet in the d and q axis respectively.

2010 7th International Multi-Conference on Systems, Signals and Devices

In equation (9), the variables have been translated into

d-q coordinates and they should be understood as
averaged variables. The d-q rotating axes are
synchronized to make zero component of the voltage
grid (Vqne!=O). As a result, the q channel current
reference, Iqref is set to zero in order to achieve unity
power factor [8].
The term coLne! is current coupled, which will
deteriorate the global behaviour of the system. To avoid
this problem, a decoupling control scheme is proposed
in figure 8. We control the network current of the phase
d-q by proportional plus Integral controller [7,8].

Fig.8. Decouple PI-d-q controJIer current

The algorithm of this current loop is given in figure 9.

We use a controller fuzzy logic for voltage.

.1 Simulation result
We use the algorithm enslavement elaborated
previously (fig.9) to control the active and reactive
power of the cascade we applied load variation between
two instants t=1.5s and t=2s. This system is simulated
by the software Matlab/Simulink environment.
Figure 10 shows the simulation results when we use full
clamping bridge and feedback control with PI
controller.
Thus this figure illustrates well the good decoupling of
the voltage loops Vd and Vq because the Vq voltage
remains practically constant (equal to zero) during the
variation. This enabled us to obtain high dynamic
performances of the controllers and decoupling.
The power active and reactive follows quietly those
references respectively. The currents iq and id are
practically proportional respectively then active and
reactive power.
The currents idl is the opposite of the current idZ The
inverter current ido has a mean value practically null.

"

GPV

ipv

D irect Power Control

Fig.9. Enslavement algorithm of P-Q control

2010 7th International Multi-Conference on Systems, Signals and Devices

____

..l _____1_____ 1. _____I _____ L ____

----1-

----1- - - - - - - - - - - - - - - -1 - - - - - 1- ---1
- - - - -t - - - - -1- - - - - + - ----; - - - - - t- - ---

- - - - -t - - - - -1- - -

...1 _____1_____ 1. ____-'_____ L ____

I - - - I
----1--- -1- - - - -1I - - - - - 1I- ---T

____

- - - - -4 - - - - -I

t- r

v.

-o----.-----_t----t--,-k--v,
- - - - ...J - - - - -1- - - I
I
- - - -"'T ---- -1- - - -

- }-------,J _____ lI
I
I
- - - - 1- - - - -r
T

- ---

- ---

____ ...l _____1___ _.L ____ _____ L ____

I
I
I
I
I
- - - - 1" - --- -1 - - -- - 1- - - - - r - --T
____ ..1 _____1_____ 1. - --- -"-______-L____--j
I
I
I
I
I
----,---- ----- ---------rpT

- -I<
.,.-------,----1
1
...J _______
2.'

1.'
8000

-;
-

-,

I
- T

_ _

- - -

I
L

I
I

1- - - - - -

1-

--

- - r -

are'

-----;!o'-.--- __+__ ----,.'5---___+_-_ ---;!

. -'-- Qdq 3
2

%.-----_t------------t_----_,---
P. .
,

J
-1
,
4 -

- , , , , , 1
T
-. ' T'
.: .,."""i:"

----

, ---------- - ---------- r ----

330
320
310

- ----- - - - - r - --- - - - , - - - - - - - - - T
- - - "1 - - - - - - - - - - 1" - - - - -1- - - - - t" - - - - - - - -t - - - - - - - - - - 1" - - - - -1- - - - - t- - ---

270
_0

--

290

- - - -I - - - - -

---- ----- ----+---- ----- ----

- - - - + --

- -1-

- - - - +- -

____

- - -

1
- - .J __________ .J. __________ .L ____
U
__________ L_
'
____ J __________
Uc2
I
I
3
O.S
1
1.5
2
2.5

_____L ____ ____ J _____ L ____

I
I
I
I
I
----l-----r----T---------r---2
- 0

1
- - - - -t - --- - - - - - - 1- - - - - -I - ----

"'__
U7cC71-c-:U=cC20i1

2.5

Fig.! O. P-Q power control and performances Systems

The grid voltage and current are in phases then the

power factor at the grid connection is unity.
We show the performances of the FLC of the input
voltage of the three-level PWM inverter. We note that,
the output voltage of PV follows perfectly its reference
which is constant and are no effect for the load
variation. Therefore the different input DC voltages of
the three-level NPC VSI are constant and practically
equal by pairs too (Uc1=Ud, become constant after a
transient state and insensible to any perturbation. In

consequence the output voltage of the three-level NPC

VSI is symmetrical

7. CONCLUSION
In this work, the aim was to control the voltage of the
solar panel in order to obtain the maximum power
possible from a PV generator, whatever the solar
insulation and temperature conditions.
Since quite a few control scheme had already been used
and had shown some defects, it was necessary to find

2010 7th International Multi-Conference on Systems, Signals and Devices

and try some other methods to optimize the output,

fuzzy logic controller seemed to be a good idea.
The controllers by fuzzy logic can provide an order
more effective than the traditional controllers for the
nonlinear systems, because there is more flexibility.
A fast and steady fuzzy logic MPPT controller was
obtained. It makes it possible indeed to find the point of
maximum power in a shorter time runs.
In this paper, we have studied stability problem of the
input voltage of the three-level NPC inverter. fed by
photovoltaic cell.
The application of the clamping bridge shows parfait
following of the input DC and his reference and the
stability of the input voltage of three-level NPC
inverter. have shows is possible to conceiver, with
frequency charger using in output the three-level
inverter.
The results obtained are full of promise to use the
inverter in high voltage and great power applications as
PV generation system with gird connected.
REFERENCES
[1] D.Y.Lee and al."An Improved MPPT converter using
current Compensation Method for Scaled PV-Applications",
0-7S03-0/03/$17.00(C) 2003, IEEE. PP.540-545.

[2] V. Salas, E. Olias, A. Barrado, A. Lazaro, "New Algorithm

Applied to Maximum Power Point Tracking without
Batteries", 21st European Photovoltaic
Solar Energy
Conference, 4-S September 2006, Dresden, Germany
[3] T. Esran, P.l. Chapman,

Comparaison of photovoltaic

array Maximum Power Point Tracking Techniques

Transactions of Energy Conversion 2006.

[4]

G.Y. Ayvazyan,

G.H. Kirakosyan,

IEEE

A.H. Vardanyan,

"Maximum Power Operation of PV system Using Fuzzy Logic

Control", Armenian Journal of Physics, vol. 1, 200S, pp. 155-

159.
[5] K.Matsui and al. "Application of parallel Connected NPC
PWM Inverters with Multilevel Modulation for AC Motor
Drive" IEEE Transaction on Power Electronics, Vo1.15.N.5.
September 2000. PP.901-907.
[6] L.Yacoubi and al."New nonlinear control of three-phase
NPC boosts rectifier operating under severe disturbances".
Mathematics and computers in simulation 63(2003) 307-320.
Published by Elsevier B.V.
[7] 1. Rodriguez and al. "Calculation of the DC-bus Capacitors

of the Back-to-back NPC Converters", EPE-EPE-PEMC 2006,

Portoroz, Slovenia, PP.137-142.
[S] Y. Tian, Analysis Simulation and DSP Based

Implementation

of Asymmetric

Three-Level

Single-Phase

Inverter in Solar Power System", degree of Master of Science,

Summer Semester 2007.