Fractional order extremum seeking approach for maximum power point tracking of photovoltaic panels

Due to the high interest in renewable energy and diversity of research regarding photovoltaic (PV) array, a great research effort is focusing nowadays on solar power generation and its performance improvement under various weather conditions. In this paper, an integrated framework was proposed, which achieved both maximum power point tracking (MPPT) and minimum ripple signals. The proposed control scheme was based on extremum-seeking (ES) combined with fractional order systems (FOS). This auto-tuning strategy was developed to maximize the PV panel output power through the regulation of the voltage input to the DC/DC converter in order to lead the PV system steady-state to a stable oscillation behavior around the maximum power point (MPP). It is shown that fractional order operators can improve the plant dynamics with respect to time response and disturbance rejection. The effectiveness of the proposed controller scheme is illustrated with simulations using measured solar radiation data.