Design of a maximum power point tracking-based PID controller for DC converter of stand-alone PV system

Abstract Stand-alone photovoltaic system (PV) produces a variance in the output voltage under variable irradiation and temperature, and variable load conditions, resulting in control challenges. The research scope is to maintain a constant output load voltage despite variations in input voltage or load. The use of a DC converter ensures that the output voltage of such systems remains constant regardless of changes in the production voltage and load. The control on a DC boost converter is employed to solve this problem. This paper presents the design of a maximum power point tracking-based (MPPT) DC converter controller for such a system. The MPPT-based PID has been proposed as a control approach and implemented to the system DC converter. Incremental Conductance (IC) algorithm has been employed as an MPPT in association with an optimized PID. The Particle Swarm optimization technique (PSO) has been used to optimize the proposed PID through selected cost function. The PV system with the loaded converter is modeled and simulated using the MATLAB/Simulink environment. The system performance is displayed using a family of curves under different operating conditions and disturbances.