Optimal perturb and observe control for MPPT based

on least square support vector machines algorithm

Omar Dahhani*, Abdeslam El Jouni, Bouchra Sefriti, & Ismail Boumhidi

Laboratory of Electronics, Signals, Systems and Informatics LESSI
University of Sidi Mohammed ben Abdellah, Faculty Of Sciences Dhar Mehraz
Fez-Atlas, Morocco
dahhani.omar@gmail.com

Abstract—In this paper, an new strategy of control that
combines perturb and observe (P&O) method with least square
support vector machines algorithm(LS-SVM) is designed. Some
problems in P&O method like oscillations around maximum
power point (MPP), failure at rapidly irradiation changing, and
low convergence rate will be overcome. An voltage step which
displaces the operating voltage to proximity of MPP is estimated
at each large and sudden change of irradiation by an LS-SVM
model. In order to save the ease and simplicity of maximum
power point tracking (MPPT) control, The LS-SVM model is
constructed off-line with reduced number of training data. The
proposed control is applied on a PV water pumping system, and
validated through simulations.
Keywords—photovoltaic; maximum power point tracking;
perturb and observe control; least square support vector machines;
photovoltaic water pumping system
I. INTRODUCTION
Generated energy from friendly sources, Knows a
remarkable development in general, solar energy in particular,
draws much attentions, because it is a pollution-free natural
energy without noise or high cost maintenances. PV power
generation systems are strongly employed in many
applications as storage and supplying electrical power in
distribution grid[1,2], or water pumping[3] etc. However,
energy from solar sources still suffers from two major kinds of
problems, the first is the low conversion efficiency and PV
high cost, the second is the problem of MPPT. In literature
many approaches that make an effort to overcome problems in
MPPT are designed, and vary from one method to another,
some ones are simple and based on voltage and current
feedback, like short circuit current and open circuit voltage
[4,5], but they are not sufficiently precise, others, are bit more
complicated as P&O and hill climbing [6,7] and need for an
electronic device to be implemented, this kind of methods are
more used in PV applications thinks to it's operating simplicity
and acceptable MPPT results. In recent decades, artificial
intelligence techniques are also used as a methods for MPPT
like fuzzy and neural network[8,9], intelligent methods give a
better results, but they require a high computational burden
and a large memory. Each of these above mentioned methods
differ from other in MPPT robustness at irradiation changes,
algorithm and implementation simplicity, cost, and required
instrumentations.
P&O algorithm is known by it's simple implementation
and few measured parameters (sensors of PVG voltage and
current). When using P&O control, system must be
continuously perturbed in order to find the MPP, even if this
point is found, system operating point still oscillates around
the MPP. Improving P&O method means especially
eliminating the high oscillations amplitude, improving the
convergence rate, and do not fail at quick changing of
irradiation. For these reasons, many researches has been
applied on P&O method, some works has been devoted to
reduce oscillations around MPP [10] by developing a variable
perturbation step size, other works focus on the issue of P&O
convergence rate under rapidly changing of climatic
conditions [11]. The present work is intended to employ the
LS-SVM intelligent method to estimate the appropriate
voltage step when irradiation is changed, then, a good
estimation of needed step, makes the operating voltage jumps
to MPP proximity. Now, the mission of P&O control becomes
very easy, it can achieve the MPP by applying just some
reduced steps of voltage perturbations, this, can eliminates
problems of oscillations, low convergence rate, and tracking
failure. In a first time, a series of tests are applied on PVG to
obtain the perturbation voltage steps corresponding to
different irradiations and system operating voltage. Then, LS-
SVM is utilized to analyse the obtained data, and to construct
the LS-SVM model. Finally, by introducing the actual
irradiation and voltage to the obtained model, we get the
appropriate step that can displaces the operating voltage to the
MPP with a higher accuracy. LS-SVM model is not more
complicated to apply in such PV application since the voltage
step estimation model is constructed off-line with a very lower
input data.
LS-SVM was introduced by Suykens and Vandewalle [12]
as a least square version of Support vector machines[13]
(SVM) which is a recent machine learning method developed
by vapnik and based on structural risk minimization and
statistic learning theory, SVM is known by it higher prediction
accuracy and better generalization capability. The least square
version contains all SVM advantages, besides, it is
characterized by a lower computational burden and reduced
training time because it performs just a set of linear equations
instead of quadratic programming in standard SVM version.

978-1-4799-7511-2/15/$31.00 ©2015 IEEE

 The new obtained P&O based LS-SVM control is applied
on a PV water pumping system which is composed by a PVG,
a DC/DC converter, and a DC motor coupled to a centrifugal
water pump. This work is organized as follows: in section 2,
each component of the PV pumping system is described and
modelled. The control strategy is presented in section 3.
Finally, simulation results of the new control on the PV
pumping system are presented in section 4.
II. MODEL OF THE PHOTOVOLTAIC WATER PUMPING
SYSTEM
The studied PV water pumping system components are, a
PVG, a DC/DC converter, a DC motor, and a centrifugal water
pump. Fig. 1, shows the assemblage of these components. In
this section each component will be described and modelled.
A. Photovoltaic generator model
PVG is composed by a number of parallel and series solar
cells to provide the desired voltage and current. The PV
generated power must be compatible with the motor nominal
functioning, then the choice of the PVG is crucial. The solar
cell is illustrated in fig. 2, it mathematical model is expressed
in equation (1) ,and the PVG is governed approximately by
equation (2):
VP  Rs I p
and PVG parallel resistances, I ph and I phg N p u I ph are
resp. the cell and PVG photocurrents, I o and I og Io u N p
are resp. the cell and PVG reverse saturation currents, I or is
the cell saturation current at Tr , I SCR is the short circuit
current at 298.15K and 1KW/m2 , K I is the short circuit
current temperature coefficient at I SCR , O is the solar
irradiation in W/m , EGO is the band gap for silicon. J is the
2
ideality factor, Tr is the reference temperature, T is the cell
temperature, K is the Boltzman’s constant, and q is the
electron charge, N s is the number of cells connected in series
and N p is the number of parallel paths. N s and N p are both
designed carefully to obtain required energy to operate the
motor pump group.
B. DC/DC power converter model
The role of the DC/DC converter is to ensure the
adaptation of the load with the PVG. The used converter is
composed by an input filter Ci and Li, a MOSFET switch, a
diode, and an output filter C0. Fig. 3, illustrates the converter
architecture, and its position in the PV pumping system. By
applying Kirchhoff’s theorem we get:
 ^ >  @ `
I P I Ph  I o exp A Vp  Rs I p  1 
Rsh
  ­ dV g
°C i I g  I Li
° dt
° dI Li
 ® Li V g  Vq  
° dt
Vg  Rsg I g
 ^ >  @ `
I g I Phg  I og exp Ag Vg  Rsg I g 1    ° dV m
Id  Im
Rshg °C o
¯ dt
3
q ªT º ªq E § 1 1 ·º The time period of the DC/DC power converter is a
Where A , Io I or « » exp « GO ¨¨  ¸¸» constant which is expressed as follows:
NJ KT ¬ Tr ¼ «¬ J k © Tr T ¹»¼
O
and I ph >I SCR  K I T  Tr @ .  T ton  toff  
1000
I p and I g are resp. the cell and PVG currents, Where t on and t off are a positive variables. The duty cycle
V p and V g are resp. the cell and PVG voltages, A and is expressed as:
Ag A / N s are resp. the cell and PVG constants, R s and
Rsg Rs u ( N s / N p ) are resp. the cell and PVG series t on
 D  
resistances, R sh and Rshg Rsh u ( N s / N p ) are resp. the cell t on  t off
 The switch state governed by the duty cycle control system Where K m is the torque constant.
gives:
D. Centrifugal pump
Vm 1 There are several types of pumps, but two kinds are the
   most used, volumetric and centrifugal pumps. In this work we
Vq 1D
consider the centrifugal pump. It resistance torque Cr that
oppose motor is expressed as:

I Li 1
    Cr K r .:2  
Id 1D

By substituting respectively, the Eq. (6) and (7) in the Where K r is proportionality coefficient. The mechanical
second and the third Eq. in (3) we get finally the converter equation of system is given by:
model as follows:
d:
 Cm  Cr J  
­ dV g dt
°C i I g  I Li
° dt
Where J is the group inertia.
° dI Li
 ® Li V g  uVm  
° dt III. PROPOSED CONTROL STRATEGY
° dVm
°C o dt uI Li  I m
¯ A. Perturb and observe control
The P&O MPPT method basic principle of operation is
Where u 1  D is the considered PV system control, based on the factor that the derivative of PVG extracted power
and 0 d u d 1 because 0 d D d 1 . as function of its output voltage is zero at the
MPP (dPg / dVg ) . At the operating point (VA,PA) on the P_V
C. DC motor curve, as shown in fig. 4, if the PVG generated voltage is
PV water pumping system is one of the several incremented by the voltage step size GV , then the generated
applications that use DC motors, Because it is suitable for power will be also incremented by a power step GP , as result,
variable speed applications. Besides, by using DC motor, the perturbation is in the right direction and P&O algorithm
DC/AC inverter will not be required. the mathematical continue with the same perturbation. The actual operating
equation of the used motor is given as follow: point is (VB,PB), and the voltage is incremented by GV , then
the operating point is displaced from (VB,PB) to (VC,PC)
causing a diminution in the extracted power, as result, the
dI m perturbation is in the wrong direction, so, the voltage should
 Vm R Im  L  Ec  
dt be decreased by GV in the next perturbation to pass back to
the MPP. P&O method still increment and decrement the
With Ec K e .: is the back electromotive force, : is the voltage periodically between A,B, and C, and the operating
rotation speed, K e is back electromotive force constant, R is point still oscillate around the MPP even at steady state
conditions, and that's the major drawback in this method,
the armature resistance, and L is the winding armature because some power loss due to the oscillations around The
inductance. The motor torque is: MPP, especially in constant and semi-constant irradiation
conditions. The choice of the perturbation voltage step size
 Cm K m I m  
 has an important role in P&O MPPT, it is clear that a reduced
perturbation voltage step size decreases oscillations amplitude
around the MPP, but under rapidly irradiation change, a high
step size of perturbation is needed to involve the convergence
rate, between these two conflicts, the perturbation step size
must be chosen too carefully. P&O method is easy
implemented in a microprocessor circuit. and requires just
­ wL
° ww 0 o w ¦i 1D iM ( X i )
n
PVG current and voltage measurements, in turn it presents an
acceptable results, this make it the most used MPPT method in °
PV applications. ° wL 0 o n D 0
°° wb ¦i 1 i
B. Least square support vector machines  ® wL  
The major advantage of LS-SVM identification in this PV ° 0 o D i Cei
application is that the high quality modelling is only in ° wei
° wL
relation with the PV system input and output measurements, ° 0 o wT M ( X i )  b  ei  Yi 0
and all PV nonlinearities are not necessary to be determined. °¯ wD i
LS-SVM is turned off-line with the given training data set
(X,Y), where X is composed by the irradiation and actual In Eq. (16), by substituting the first and the third formulas
operating voltage, and Y is the appropriate voltage step that into the fourth, subjected to the second, we obtain the
corresponds to X. the feature space representation of LS-SVM following set of linear equations:
is given by:

ª0 1Tn ºªb º ª0º

 Y(X) w M (X)  b 
T
  « »« » «Y »  
¬1n :  C I n ¼ ¬D ¼
1
¬ ¼
Where w is a vector in the feature space with high
dimension, M is a function that maps the input data from the Where Y >Y1 ,...;Yn @T , 1n >1,...,1@T , D >D1 ,...,D n @T ,
original space to a feature space, b is a regression model bias. I n is an nu n identity matrix, n is the number of samples, and
Based on LS-SVM literature, The estimation problem is
:  ƒ nun is the kernel matrix, it is defined by
formulated as the following minimization problem:
: ij M ( X i ) T M ( X j ) K ( X i , X j ) , with K is the kernel
function. For our nonlinear regression we use the Gaussian
1 T 1
w w  C¦ n e2 
2
 min J ( w, e)  kernel function K ( X i , X j ) exp( X i  X j / V 2 ) , with V is
w ,e 2 2 i 1 i
the kernel positive constant. By solving (17), the regression
estimation function takes the following form:
Subjected to the following equality constraints:

¦
n
 Yi wT M ( X i )  b  ei , i 1,...n    Yˆ ( X * ) i 1
Di K(X *, X i )  b  

Where C is a rule factor, e is the regression error and n is Where X * is a new input value of irradiation and voltage,
the number of samples. The Lagrange function is constructed and Yˆ is the estimated value of voltage step. Fig. 5 and 6
to solve the constrained optimisation as follow: illustrate respectively the functioning algorithm of the used
LS-SVM technique, and the estimated voltage steps at
different values of irradiation and a constant actual voltage.
 L(w, b, e, D )
n
^ `
J (w, e)  ¦i 1D i wT M ( X i )  b  ei  Yi 

Where D i is the Lagrange multiplier. Partial derivatives of

w ,b, e, and D give respectively:
 x Come back to the simple P&O which removes the
C. Perturb and observe based on least square support vector
small estimation error, and forces the system to stay
machines operating at optimal conditions.
Whenever the illumination changes, the MPP also changes,
and the output voltage starts to increase slowly by the voltage Fig. 7, illustrate more the P&O based on LS-SVM
step size GV at each period of P&O control, when GV is operating algorithm.
considerably small for reasons of minimizing oscillations, the
convergence rate will be also reduced. On the other hand, IV. SIMULATION RESULTS
increasing GV , provoke oscillations around the MPP at The used PV water pumping system To validate the new
steady conditions. The climatic conditions have two cases, control strategy, has the parameters below:
either steady, either variable. The proposed strategy of control
is based on these two cases, so when the irradiation is stable x Photovoltaic panel SM55:
the simple P&O is applied but with a very reduced voltage
Rs 0.1124 : , Rsh 6500 : , J 1.7404 , I SCR 3.45 A
step size, as results, there is no oscillations around MPP, and
the system operates at its optimal conditions. Otherwise, if ,I 4.842 PA , K I 4.10 4
A/ K and
or
irradiation changes, the LS-SVM estimation is launched to
estimate the voltage step 'V which can achieves T 298.15 K .
r
approximatly the optimal value of voltage in just one cycle.
LS-SVM model is obtained off-line with a slight number of x DC motor: ABB DMI 180B.
data, this make it less complexes and more quick to be applied V 400 V , I 12.2 A , : 104.7 rad / s ,
in such photovoltaic application. The new strategy is done by mn mn n
the following steps: R 9.84 : , L 0.12 H , J= 0.06 Kg m2.
x Reduce the voltage step size GV to a small value so
x DC/DC converter:
that the oscillations become also very small and
doesn’t disturb the user of the PV system. L 3.5 mH , C 4.7 mF , Ci 47 mF
0 0
x The LS-SVM estimation intervenes just at irradiation
changes, and calculate the needed voltage step 'V . x Centrifugal pump:

x Adding the found voltage step 'V to the actual Kr =28.10-4w(s/rad)3, : 104.7 rad / s .
n
operating voltage.
 In this part, the standard P&O control and the P&O based step to be near of MPP when irradiation changes. In other
LS-SVM control are applied on the same PV water pumping word, the intelligent method put the operating point near of
system. Three important simulation results in fig. 8, are MPP and lets P&O control keeps this optimal operating. The
presented by both controls to show the performances of our obtained intelligent control is applied on a photovoltaic water
new control strategy. pumping system, and compared with the simple P&O in some
important simulation results to shows the improvement of
V. CONCLUSION P&O when LS-SVM is used.
In this paper, we constructed a new strategy of control, by
combining the famous P&O method for MPPT with an
intelligent technique which is LS-SVM. the idea was to
operate the P&O with a fixed and reduced voltage step size,
and to use LS-SVM to estimate the needed appropriate voltage

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