Home |
Search |
Today's Posts |
#51
|
|||
|
|||
John Popelish wrote:
Roy Lewallen wrote: In my limited experience, you have to be a little careful using a switching, or even a series pass, regulator with a solar panel. Most are designed to regulate voltage coming from a relatively stiff source, and some become unstable when hooked to a high impedance source like a solar panel. This can often be overcome by putting a big capacitor across the panel, and it can of course be overcome by designing the regulator to function properly with the high impedance source in the first place. And quite a few regulators work just fine without modification. But it's something to keep in mind when using a regulator designed for more conventional applications. Just for efficiency reasons, I think you would want ot have enough capacitance across the regulator input that the cell resistance drops voltage only with respect ot the average output current, not the switcher peak value. This can be a pretty big factor in the overall efficiency. Using a switcher that has little ripple current on its input (two phase boost, for instance) makes this much easier. That's not the point. Because a switcher tends to draw a constant power from a load it's input impedance has a negative resistive component. If you match this with a source that has a too-high impedance it'll be _unstable_; a big capacitor would just slow it down in this case. Presumably what you need is a controller that detects when the supply voltage gets down to some threshold, then regulates the supply-side current rather than the load-side voltage. Come to think of it that'd be a fun thing to design... -- Tim Wescott Wescott Design Services http://www.wescottdesign.com |
#52
|
|||
|
|||
Tim Wescott wrote:
John Popelish wrote: Just for efficiency reasons, I think you would want ot have enough capacitance across the regulator input that the cell resistance drops voltage only with respect ot the average output current, not the switcher peak value. This can be a pretty big factor in the overall efficiency. Using a switcher that has little ripple current on its input (two phase boost, for instance) makes this much easier. That's not the point. Because a switcher tends to draw a constant power from a load it's input impedance has a negative resistive component. If you match this with a source that has a too-high impedance it'll be _unstable_; a big capacitor would just slow it down in this case. Presumably what you need is a controller that detects when the supply voltage gets down to some threshold, then regulates the supply-side current rather than the load-side voltage. Come to think of it that'd be a fun thing to design... Very few switchers draw an instantaneously constant power from the unregulated source. Almost all can draw an average constant power (over the switching period). The difference means a lot when you consider what the variations do to the total losses in the solar cells. You missed my point, completely. -- John Popelish |
#53
|
|||
|
|||
Tim Wescott wrote:
John Popelish wrote: Just for efficiency reasons, I think you would want ot have enough capacitance across the regulator input that the cell resistance drops voltage only with respect ot the average output current, not the switcher peak value. This can be a pretty big factor in the overall efficiency. Using a switcher that has little ripple current on its input (two phase boost, for instance) makes this much easier. That's not the point. Because a switcher tends to draw a constant power from a load it's input impedance has a negative resistive component. If you match this with a source that has a too-high impedance it'll be _unstable_; a big capacitor would just slow it down in this case. Presumably what you need is a controller that detects when the supply voltage gets down to some threshold, then regulates the supply-side current rather than the load-side voltage. Come to think of it that'd be a fun thing to design... Very few switchers draw an instantaneously constant power from the unregulated source. Almost all can draw an average constant power (over the switching period). The difference means a lot when you consider what the variations do to the total losses in the solar cells. You missed my point, completely. -- John Popelish |
#54
|
|||
|
|||
On Tue, 13 Apr 2004 16:27:29 -0700, Tim Wescott
wrote: John Popelish wrote: Just for efficiency reasons, I think you would want ot have enough capacitance across the regulator input that the cell resistance drops voltage only with respect ot the average output current, not the switcher peak value. This can be a pretty big factor in the overall efficiency. Using a switcher that has little ripple current on its input (two phase boost, for instance) makes this much easier. That's not the point. Because a switcher tends to draw a constant power from a load it's input impedance has a negative resistive component. If you match this with a source that has a too-high impedance it'll be _unstable_; a big capacitor would just slow it down in this case. While there certainly are going to be stability issues, using a switcher with say 50 % duty cycle will draw 0 A half of the time (i.e. the PV cell is operating in the constant voltage mode) and 2 Iave the other half of the time (i.e. the cell would operate in the constant current mode) and never operate at the maximum power point (here assumed to be at Iave). Sufficient parallel capacitances and/or series inductances or some push-pull arrangement will keep the current constantly at Iave and thus at the maximum power point. Paul |
#55
|
|||
|
|||
On Tue, 13 Apr 2004 16:27:29 -0700, Tim Wescott
wrote: John Popelish wrote: Just for efficiency reasons, I think you would want ot have enough capacitance across the regulator input that the cell resistance drops voltage only with respect ot the average output current, not the switcher peak value. This can be a pretty big factor in the overall efficiency. Using a switcher that has little ripple current on its input (two phase boost, for instance) makes this much easier. That's not the point. Because a switcher tends to draw a constant power from a load it's input impedance has a negative resistive component. If you match this with a source that has a too-high impedance it'll be _unstable_; a big capacitor would just slow it down in this case. While there certainly are going to be stability issues, using a switcher with say 50 % duty cycle will draw 0 A half of the time (i.e. the PV cell is operating in the constant voltage mode) and 2 Iave the other half of the time (i.e. the cell would operate in the constant current mode) and never operate at the maximum power point (here assumed to be at Iave). Sufficient parallel capacitances and/or series inductances or some push-pull arrangement will keep the current constantly at Iave and thus at the maximum power point. Paul |
#56
|
|||
|
|||
Paul Keinanen wrote:
On Mon, 12 Apr 2004 13:02:38 -0700, "Watson A.Name \"Watt Sun - the Dark Remover\"" wrote: Joerg wrote: Another option might be to use a different voltage panel, whatever has a good price, and then use a small switcher to run the cells at their optimum load. Regards, Joerg. Seems foolhardy to me, to use a boost circuit, and waste a lot of power. Just put more PV cells in series to increase the voltage. The solar cell operates as a (badly) regulated power supply with current limiting. At low load currents, the cell operates nearly as a constant voltage source, but after a specific current (for a given illumination) it operates nearly as a constant current source and deliver approximately that current even into a short circuit. The largest power from the cell (for a specific illumination) is obtained at the point it switches from constant voltage to constant current mode, in which both the voltage is quite close (within 30 %) of both the maximum voltage (as measured at open circuit) and maximum current (as measured at short circuit). This maximum power point varies with illumination, but if the switcher always loads the cell at this maximum power point, the largest available energy at a specific time is extracted from the cell independent of illumination. Even if the losses in the maximum power point tracker is 10-20 %, usually more energy can be obtained than running the module in some non-optimal constant voltage or constant current mode. Paul Anybody got any real data on this stuff. I set out to build a constant power solar battery charger. I was gonna just put a PIC to measure the voltage/current and ratchet the switcher duty cycle up and down around peak power. Went out in the yard at noon and plotted some curves. Yep, there's a pronounced power peak right around 14V. At lower intensities, the shape of the curve is the same, but it moves sideways. Ok, my pulse width strategy should track that. Cool. Then I turned the panel ever so slightly away from the sun. I was amazed at how dramatically things changed with just a small angle. Looks like I'd gain WAY more watt-hours/day by tracking the sun than by anything else I could think of. mike -- Return address is VALID. Bunch of stuff For Sale and Wanted at the link below. Toshiba & Compaq LiIon Batteries, Test Equipment Honda CB-125S $800 in PDX Yaesu FTV901R Transverter, 30pS pulser Tektronix Concept Books, spot welding head... http://www.geocities.com/SiliconValley/Monitor/4710/ |
#57
|
|||
|
|||
Paul Keinanen wrote:
On Mon, 12 Apr 2004 13:02:38 -0700, "Watson A.Name \"Watt Sun - the Dark Remover\"" wrote: Joerg wrote: Another option might be to use a different voltage panel, whatever has a good price, and then use a small switcher to run the cells at their optimum load. Regards, Joerg. Seems foolhardy to me, to use a boost circuit, and waste a lot of power. Just put more PV cells in series to increase the voltage. The solar cell operates as a (badly) regulated power supply with current limiting. At low load currents, the cell operates nearly as a constant voltage source, but after a specific current (for a given illumination) it operates nearly as a constant current source and deliver approximately that current even into a short circuit. The largest power from the cell (for a specific illumination) is obtained at the point it switches from constant voltage to constant current mode, in which both the voltage is quite close (within 30 %) of both the maximum voltage (as measured at open circuit) and maximum current (as measured at short circuit). This maximum power point varies with illumination, but if the switcher always loads the cell at this maximum power point, the largest available energy at a specific time is extracted from the cell independent of illumination. Even if the losses in the maximum power point tracker is 10-20 %, usually more energy can be obtained than running the module in some non-optimal constant voltage or constant current mode. Paul Anybody got any real data on this stuff. I set out to build a constant power solar battery charger. I was gonna just put a PIC to measure the voltage/current and ratchet the switcher duty cycle up and down around peak power. Went out in the yard at noon and plotted some curves. Yep, there's a pronounced power peak right around 14V. At lower intensities, the shape of the curve is the same, but it moves sideways. Ok, my pulse width strategy should track that. Cool. Then I turned the panel ever so slightly away from the sun. I was amazed at how dramatically things changed with just a small angle. Looks like I'd gain WAY more watt-hours/day by tracking the sun than by anything else I could think of. mike -- Return address is VALID. Bunch of stuff For Sale and Wanted at the link below. Toshiba & Compaq LiIon Batteries, Test Equipment Honda CB-125S $800 in PDX Yaesu FTV901R Transverter, 30pS pulser Tektronix Concept Books, spot welding head... http://www.geocities.com/SiliconValley/Monitor/4710/ |
#58
|
|||
|
|||
mike wrote:
Anybody got any real data on this stuff. There's no shortage of information about this. Useful keywords are "insolation" and "solar insolation" (the word "solar" is slightly redundant but it's commonly included). In summer, you can expect a maximum of 1 kWatt per square metre to reach the surface of the earth. The units most commonly used are kW-Hour per square metre per day - I'll call them Units here. Insolation tables for the USA can be seen at: http://www.suntrekenergy.com/sunhours.htm These figures are somewhat suspect - the difference between "high" and "low" seems too small (a maximum of 6 Units is rather low), especially when compared with the following, which contains some good maps: http://www.wattsun.com/resources/ins...map_index.html On this page, click on Flat Plate Collector, Single Axis Tracker and Double Axis Tracker. The latter can produce up to 14 Units in summer. The improvement when tracking the sun's angle is very large. It pays to live in California. I have seen a similar table somewhere for the UK, showing that 5 Units is the best that can be expected, and maybe less than 1 Unit in winter. Bear in mind that the efficiency of Solar Cells is less than 20% in the very latest state-of-the-art devices, typically 10%, and maybe as low as 5% in reject/hobbyist cells. Generating hot water directly from flat solar collectors is probably more efficient, and certainly cheaper, but not much use if it's electricity you want. If, on a bad day, the cell voltage is less than the battery voltage, you can still charge the battery. Look at: http://www.elecdesign.com/Articles/A...262/6262.html# This article appeared in Electronic Design, Sept 14 1998. It describes a circuit for a Maximum-power-point-tracking solar battery charger. The principle is simple: the duty-ratio of a switch-mode power supply is continuously modulated at about 50Hz. The change in output on each cycle is used to determine whether a higher or lower duty-ratio would increase the output power. A phase-sensitive detector and feedback loop determines whether to increase or decrease the average duty-ratio. It settles at the point of maximum power. As the article points out, it works for other energy sources such as water-wheels and other devices where the shape of the "energy curve" is not precisely known. When used as a battery charger the voltage of the battery is fairly constant, so "maximum power" means "maximum current". At the solar cell end, we are working at maximum power, although the voltage may vary. The "maximum power transfer" condition is when 50% of the power goes to the load, and 50% is dissipated in the cell. I don't know if this is precisely true in a solar cell, but it certainly implies considerable power dissipation in the cell, which may shorten its life. On the other hand, a cell of 1 square metre will have 1000 watts of solar power falling on it, and may generate 100 watts of electrical power, of which we may get 50 watts into our battery. The 50 watts dissipated in the cell is much less than the 1000 watts from the sun - so maybe it doesn't matter. J.S.Blackburn, London UK. |
#59
|
|||
|
|||
mike wrote:
Anybody got any real data on this stuff. There's no shortage of information about this. Useful keywords are "insolation" and "solar insolation" (the word "solar" is slightly redundant but it's commonly included). In summer, you can expect a maximum of 1 kWatt per square metre to reach the surface of the earth. The units most commonly used are kW-Hour per square metre per day - I'll call them Units here. Insolation tables for the USA can be seen at: http://www.suntrekenergy.com/sunhours.htm These figures are somewhat suspect - the difference between "high" and "low" seems too small (a maximum of 6 Units is rather low), especially when compared with the following, which contains some good maps: http://www.wattsun.com/resources/ins...map_index.html On this page, click on Flat Plate Collector, Single Axis Tracker and Double Axis Tracker. The latter can produce up to 14 Units in summer. The improvement when tracking the sun's angle is very large. It pays to live in California. I have seen a similar table somewhere for the UK, showing that 5 Units is the best that can be expected, and maybe less than 1 Unit in winter. Bear in mind that the efficiency of Solar Cells is less than 20% in the very latest state-of-the-art devices, typically 10%, and maybe as low as 5% in reject/hobbyist cells. Generating hot water directly from flat solar collectors is probably more efficient, and certainly cheaper, but not much use if it's electricity you want. If, on a bad day, the cell voltage is less than the battery voltage, you can still charge the battery. Look at: http://www.elecdesign.com/Articles/A...262/6262.html# This article appeared in Electronic Design, Sept 14 1998. It describes a circuit for a Maximum-power-point-tracking solar battery charger. The principle is simple: the duty-ratio of a switch-mode power supply is continuously modulated at about 50Hz. The change in output on each cycle is used to determine whether a higher or lower duty-ratio would increase the output power. A phase-sensitive detector and feedback loop determines whether to increase or decrease the average duty-ratio. It settles at the point of maximum power. As the article points out, it works for other energy sources such as water-wheels and other devices where the shape of the "energy curve" is not precisely known. When used as a battery charger the voltage of the battery is fairly constant, so "maximum power" means "maximum current". At the solar cell end, we are working at maximum power, although the voltage may vary. The "maximum power transfer" condition is when 50% of the power goes to the load, and 50% is dissipated in the cell. I don't know if this is precisely true in a solar cell, but it certainly implies considerable power dissipation in the cell, which may shorten its life. On the other hand, a cell of 1 square metre will have 1000 watts of solar power falling on it, and may generate 100 watts of electrical power, of which we may get 50 watts into our battery. The 50 watts dissipated in the cell is much less than the 1000 watts from the sun - so maybe it doesn't matter. J.S.Blackburn, London UK. |
#60
|
|||
|
|||
Hi J.S.;
"J.S.Blackburn" wrote: mike wrote: Anybody got any real data on this stuff. There's no shortage of information about this. Useful keywords are "insolation" and "solar insolation" (the word "solar" is slightly redundant but it's commonly included). In summer, you can expect a maximum of 1 kWatt per square metre to reach the surface of the earth. This is miss leading. While there are places, nearer to the equator, that can have 1KW/m^2 at noon this is not the norm. The rule of thumb is 1KW/m^2 normal to the sun not flat on the ground. Or about 100W/ft^2. This is a tilted surface directly facing the sun. The units most commonly used are kW-Hour per square metre per day - I'll call them Units here. Insolation tables for the USA can be seen at: http://www.suntrekenergy.com/sunhours.htm These figures are somewhat suspect - the difference between "high" and "low" seems too small (a maximum of 6 Units is rather low), especially when compared with the following, which contains some good maps: http://www.wattsun.com/resources/ins...map_index.html On this page, click on Flat Plate Collector, Single Axis Tracker and Double Axis Tracker. The latter can produce up to 14 Units in summer. The improvement when tracking the sun's angle is very large. It pays to live in California. I have seen a similar table somewhere for the UK, showing that 5 Units is the best that can be expected, and maybe less than 1 Unit in winter. Bear in mind that the efficiency of Solar Cells is less than 20% in the very latest state-of-the-art devices, typically 10%, and maybe as low as 5% in reject/hobbyist cells. Generating hot water directly from flat solar collectors is probably more efficient, and certainly cheaper, but not much use if it's electricity you want. If, on a bad day, the cell voltage is less than the battery voltage, you can still charge the battery. Look at: http://www.elecdesign.com/Articles/A...262/6262.html# This article appeared in Electronic Design, Sept 14 1998. It describes a circuit for a Maximum-power-point-tracking solar battery charger. The principle is simple: the duty-ratio of a switch-mode power supply is continuously modulated at about 50Hz. The change in output on each cycle is used to determine whether a higher or lower duty-ratio would increase the output power. A phase-sensitive detector and feedback loop determines whether to increase or decrease the average duty-ratio. It settles at the point of maximum power. As the article points out, it works for other energy sources such as water-wheels and other devices where the shape of the "energy curve" is not precisely known. When used as a battery charger the voltage of the battery is fairly constant, so "maximum power" means "maximum current". At the solar cell end, we are working at maximum power, although the voltage may vary. The "maximum power transfer" condition is when 50% of the power goes to the load, and 50% is dissipated in the cell. I don't know if this is precisely true in a solar cell, but it certainly implies considerable power dissipation in the cell, which may shorten its life. On the other hand, a cell of 1 square metre will have 1000 watts of solar power falling on it, and may generate 100 watts of electrical power, of which we may get 50 watts into our battery. The 50 watts dissipated in the cell is much less than the 1000 watts from the sun - so maybe it doesn't matter. J.S.Blackburn, London UK. Duane -- Home of the $35 Solar Tracker Receiver http://www.redrok.com/electron.htm#led3X[*] Powered by \ \ \ //| Thermonuclear Solar Energy from the Sun / | Energy (the SUN) \ \ \ / / | Red Rock Energy \ \ / / | Duane C. Johnson Designer \ \ / \ / | 1825 Florence St Heliostat,Control,& Mounts | White Bear Lake, Minnesota === \ / \ | USA 55110-3364 === \ | (651)426-4766 use Courier New Font \ | (my email: address) \ | http://www.redrok.com (Web site) === |
Reply |
Thread Tools | Search this Thread |
Display Modes | |
|
|
Similar Threads | ||||
Thread | Forum | |||
Amateur Radio Newsline(tm) Report 1420 - October 29, 2004 | Dx | |||
Amateur Radio Newsline(tm) Report 1420 - October 29, 2004 | Dx | |||
Cell Phone Hardline | Antenna | |||
SOLAR constant voltage Xmfr question? | Equipment | |||
SOLAR constant voltage Xmfr question? | Equipment |