GMPPT by using PSO based on Lévy flight for photovoltaic system under partial shading conditions

Abstract

The photovoltaic (PV) system contemplated in the study displays multiple peaks on power–voltage (P–V) curve under partial shading condition (PSC) results in a complicated maximum power point tracking (MPPT) process. Conventional MPPT algorithms work in an effective manner under uniform irradiance conditions. However, these algorithms are unable to track the global peak effectively under different irradiance conditions. In this study, a velocity of particle swarm optimisation-based Levy flight (VPSO-LF) for Global MPPT of PV system under PSCs is proposed. For the changes in irradiance, when verified with VPSO-LF, tracking time and a number of iterations are fewer to reach the global peak of PV array. It also minimises the number of tuning parameters of the velocity of particle swarm optimisation (PSO). The proposed technique is simulated in MATLAB/ SIMULINK as well as experimentally validated. It is observed that the results obtained using VPSO-LF is superior to conventional PSO and hill-climbing algorithm under different patterns of PV array.