Cubesat's power generation optimization based on orbital and physical parameters

This paper, studies the Power Generation Unit (PGU) subsystems of the CubeSat. Through simulation, we show the significance of solar panels and battery characteristics and power system design on the output power of the PGU. In this regard, we replace the triple junction GaAs solar panels and SAFT MP176065 batteries of an existing CubeSat called XSAT (launched by Singapore) by properties of NeXt Triple Junction (XTJ) solar cells and SAFT VES 100 lithium-ion batteries. We propose a cell layout design algorithm which increases the battery capacity and the solar array output as well as the overall efficiency. We show that through the proposed design and optimization approach, the CubeSat's ability to carry payloads during the eclipse period- in which there is no solar source to generate power- increases. In addition, we simulate and evaluate the most commonly used techniques for extracting the maximum power from satellite's solar panels under the influence of different orbital conditions. The results indicate that while in the ideal conditions, i.e. no self-spinning movements, thermal compensated fixed voltage method, with the efficiency of 86%, has the highest efficiency; it does not work well under real orbital conditions. In this paper, we propose a new solar layout design to optimize the reliability and power efficiency. This arrangement not only would ensure the high reliability of the solar system, but also it increases the efficiency and output power of the PGU without the need for changing the dimensions of solar panels.