A Novel Photovoltaic/Battery Structure for Solar Electrical Vehicles [PVBS for SEV]

Authors

Mahmoud Alahmad, University of Nebraska - LincolnFollow
Mohamed Amer Chaaban, University of Nebraska-LincolnFollow
Lana Chaar, The Petroleum InstituteFollow

Date of this Version

2011

Citation

IEEE Vehicle Power and Propulsion Conference (VPPC), 2011 doi: 10.1109/VPPC.2011.6043145

Comments

Copyright IEEE 2011. Used by permission

Abstract

In this paper, we propose a new flexible Photovoltaic/Battery charging Structure for Solar Electrical Vehicles (PVBS), where the interconnection of the system is dynamically changing based on current shading conditions across PV modules to provide intelligent system, as well as to provide flexibility, performance, and efficiency enhancement for the SEV. PVBS is expected to 1) provide a battery charging efficiency improvement over existing employed topologies; 2) provide new means to match the computing load with the PV system performance metrics shading and mismatches; 3) and provide elastic reconfigurable system expected to spur research advancements and innovations to make future SEV design smarter. A MATLAB simulation model and an actual test were conducted to verify the proposed configuration. These results show that the proposed system increases the efficiency of the traditional PV/Battery charging strategies and smooths the shape of P-V curve to a single peak in the curve.