A device for evaluating photovoltaic (PV) module output performance and degradation

This paper aims to design and develop a system that can extract the PV module Standard Test Condition (STC) parameters of a PV module under real operating conditions (ROC) using Arduino Board Technology. The system captures the voltage and current under ROC and by applying reverse calculation to get the STC parameters. Then the power degradation of the PV module is calculated by comparing the calculated power at STC with the actual power stated in the data specification. Based on experimental results showed that the developed system was able to identify the power degradation almost equal to the actual power degradation. 5.04% of the power degradation was obtained from the tested PV module

Efficient Operation of Lithium-Ion Batteries Based on GPV-Forecasted PV Output

Load forecasting is essential in order to fulfil a demand of the consumer. Nevertheless, for a small-scale Battery Energy Storage System (BESS) based on sole photovoltaic (PV), it needs a very strong effort to always meet a consumer's demand due to unstable meteorological conditions. An ideal PV system requires a constructive control strategy in order to alleviate its fluctuating output. In this study, an energy control scheme that executes next-day forecast of generation for the purpose of fully utilizing the stored energy in the batteries has been proposed. Experimental equipment was structured and the operation was completely administered by RX621 microcontroller. The implemented system worked very well without any distractions and it succeeded in controlling and preventing the batteries from being over-charged or overdischarged. Impressively, average consumption for September 2015 is considerably high, which suggests that the proposed control succeeded in utilizing energy corresponded to 98.6 % of the monthly-average generation