Improving the Performance of Grid-Connected Cascaded H-bridge Photovoltaic Inverters under Asymmetric Insolation Conditions

In recent years, solar energy has gained a great deal of attention. Hence, the photovoltaic (PV) systems which convert the solar energy into electricity should achieve high efficiency, low manufacturing cost, and high quality of electric power to attract the consumers. Although Cascaded H-Bride (CHB) inverter is a suitable choice for injection of PV power into grid, its control issues have not been completely solved. One of the main challenges in CHB inverter is low margin of stability when the H-bridge cells are under imbalance operating conditions. In this paper, a new MPPT algorithm is proposed for a CHB photovoltaic inverter. The proposed approach not only tracks the maximum point of distinct PV arrays under symmetric insolation, but also behaves well under asymmetric insolation conditions. The latter is achieved through shifting the operating point of PV arrays and using the modulation index of H-bridge cells as a degree of freedom. The usefulness and validity of new method is confirmed by simulation and experiments on a 7-level CHB photovoltaic inverter.