A General Approach for Quantifying the Benefit of Distributed Power Electronics for Fine Grained MPPT in Photovoltaic Applications Using 3-D Modeling

This paper deals with photovoltaic power installations in urban environments. A general simulation method is developed to quantify the total energy yield for photovoltaic (PV) installation sites exploiting different levels of Distributed Maximum Power Point Tracking (DMPPT) granularity. The process includes 3-D modeling, shading evaluation of the installation site, and irradiance calculations on the PV surfaces on an hourly basis throughout the year. Three leading microconverter topologies are analyzed and the cost/performance tradeoff is discussed for panel-level DMPPT. The energy yield evaluation technique is confirmed by means of several miniature PV acquisition units for frequent irradiance and temperature measurements in the installation site. The yearly energy yield benefit is shown to be highly dependent on the relative shading in the three installation sites. It is found that the energy yield benefit easily outweighs the power electronics costs in two of the three installations for panel-level DMPPT. The analysis method can be used by PV installers and system designers for accurate energy yield prediction, as well as power electronics engineers who need to bound the cost of their design based on the net energy benefit of the installed PV system.