A COMPREHENSIVE OVERVIEW OF SOFT COMPUTING BASED MPPT TECHNIQUES FOR PARTIAL SHADING CONDITIONS IN PV SYSTEMS

Abstract

Nowadays, solar or photovoltaic energy is the most commonly used renewableenergy resources in the world. Despite its advantages such as freely available, lowmaintenance cost, pollution-free, inexhaustible, and reliable, its low conversionefficiency is a major drawback. To increase the efficiency of the photovoltaic system,all photovoltaic modules in the array must be operated at maximum power point.Therefore, maximum power point tracking technique is used for predicting andtracking the maximum power point. In the literature, maximum power pointtracking techniques are generally classified as soft computing and conventional. Softcomputing techniques are more preferred from both of them, because they canaccurately track maximum power point of photovoltaic systems. In this study, anextensive review of soft computing based maximum power point trackingtechniques under partial shading conditions until today is presented. Thetechniques are compared from the point of photovoltaic array dependency, sensorsrequired, tracking efficiency, tracking speed, algorithm complexity, and oscillationaround maximum power point.