Design and Development of an Automatic Solar Tracker

Energy crisis is one of the most crucial topics in today's world. Conventional energy resources are not only limited and costly, but also the prime cause for environmental pollution. The environmental pollution and rising cost of the fossil fuels have drawn considerable attention to renewable energy sources. Solar energy, being the cleanest and most reliable renewable energy source, is widely utilized in thermal systems to heat water and air. It offers a vast opportunity for public and private organizations to reduce carbon emissions and cut electricity costs. A viable approach to maximizing the solar panel efficiency is solar tracking. This paper, therefore, proposes an automatic microcontroller-based solar tracker with a hybrid algorithm for locating the sun's position. The proposed hybrid solar tracking algorithm combines both sensors and mathematical models to determine the precise sun's position, thereby harnessing optimal solar energy for all weather conditions. Experimental results consistently show that the hybrid solar tracking algorithm can yield higher solar power that the traditional active and chronological algorithms. A webpage was also developed to facilitate real-time monitoring of solar data. As such, the solar tracking process is fully automated, maximizing the collection and management of solar energy for solar thermal systems.