Fuzzy Controller for a Voltage-Regulated Solar-Powered MPPT System for Hybrid Power System Applications

This paper presents the design of a fuzzy-logic-based voltage-regulated solar power maximum power point tracking (MPPT) system for applications involving hybrid power systems. The system contains a solar power system and battery as the primary and secondary power sources, respectively. The solar system alone supplies power to the electric motor and maintains the output voltage at a predetermined level when it has sufficient power. When the solar power is insufficient, the solar system is operated at its maximum power point (MPP) and the battery is engaged to compensate for the insufficiency. First, a variant of the incremental conductance MPP condition was established. Under the MPP condition, the voltage-regulated MPPT system was formulated as a feedback control system, where the MPP condition and voltage regulation requirements were used as the system inputs. Next, a fuzzy controller was developed to perform the voltage-regulated MPPT function for the hybrid power system. A simulation model based on Matrix laboratory (MATLAB)/SIMULINK (a block diagram environment for multi-domain simulation and model-based design) and a piecewise linear electric circuit simulation (PLECS) tool for controlling the dc motor velocity was developed to verify the voltage-regulated solar power MPPT system.