Bypass Diodes Configurations for Mismatch and Hotspot Reduction in PV Modules

Partial shading in PV module creates mismatch among the connected cells that results in unexpected consequences such as power reduction, mismatch loss, and hotspot formation whose long term existence can do physical damage to the PV module. In general, bypass diodes are installed in the module to prevent the shaded cells from mismatch, power consumption, and hotspot. However, the performance of module connected bypass diodes is very dependent on the degree and area of shade occurrence. Also, various bypass diodes configurations are available that can be adopted to improve the module performance during shading. In this paper, various bypass diodes configurations of module are examined in term of power generation, mismatch loss, efficiency, and ease of installation under different partial shading scenarios to study the optimal configuration for the PV module. The entire study is done in the MATLAB using power-voltage (P~V) curves analysis of the PV module.