Comparative Evaluation of Three Maximum Power Point Tracking Algorithms for Photovoltaic Systems using Quadratic Boost-Converter

In this paper, we present a comparison of three types of algorithms: Perturb and Observe (P&O), Incremental Conductance (InCnd), and Fuzzy Logic Controller (FLC) that track the maximum power point (MPP) of a photovoltaic system (PV) over varying conditions of solar irradiation and temperature. The PV system is composed of solar panels, a resistive load, and an MPPT controller with pulse width modulation (PWM) technique for driving the DC-DC Quadratic Boost converter (QBC). This comparison, based on three criteria, namely stability, time response and, power efficiency, demonstrates the benefit of employing an MPPT with variable step monitoring. The energy obtained using those three algorithms is practically similar, with a considerable improvement for the Fuzzy Logic Controller.