A novel Zig-Zag scheme for power enhancement of partially shaded solar arrays

This paper proposes a novel Zig-Zag scheme of arrangement for the total cross tied interconnection of photovoltaic modules for reducing partial shading losses and thus enhancing power generation. The performance improvement over classical total-cross-tied connection has been validated by extensive simulation results. The novel scheme of arrangement is also compared with the optimal total cross tied configuration and results show that the new scheme of arrangement showed very similar operational characteristics. The rearrangement of modules is performed without varying the electrical connection of the modules in the array. Simulation results shows that the new scheme of rearrangement lessens the number of multiple local maxima in power-voltage (P-V) characteristics which further simplifies the Global Maximum Power Point (GMPP) tracking algorithm. The performance of the system is investigated for five different shading patterns.