Analysis and comparison of different PV array configurations under partial shading conditions

In the world, energy needs of people are met by fossil fuels. However, fossil fuels are getting depleted day by day and using of them causes negative effect on the environment. Moreover, energy demand of the world has increased in recent years. Hence, in order to meet the energy demand, especially solar or photovoltaic energy is widely used among the renewable energy sources. Photovoltaic cell directly convert solar energy into electricity. However, efficiency of photovoltaic cell is negatively affected by partial shading. Partial shading generally occurs on photovoltaic systems due to passing cloud, neighboring building, tree, etc. As a result of partial shading, produced power from photovoltaic system is less than the expected power value. One of the solutions of this problem is photovoltaic array configurations scheme. In this study, five different photovoltaic array configuration schemes: Series, Series-Parallel, Total-Cross-Tied, Bridged-Linked, and Honey-Comb, are carried out using 6 × 6 photovoltaic array under six different shading cases. Simulations of all shading cases are implemented using MATLAB/Simulink. In general, the obtained maximum power results under all partial shading cases show that Total-Cross-Tied configuration has the best performance according to other configurations. Furthermore, the obtained results have been compared in terms of shading loss, mismatch loss, and fill factor.