Proposal MPPT Algorithm Using the Kalman Filter

Solar power is an abundant energy source on Earth. The photovoltaic technology employs photovoltaic panels to convert sunlight into electric energy. Photovoltaic panels themselves have very low efficiency, which means they provide little power compared to the maximum one. The power maximization is influenced by variables such as temperature and solar irradiation, and the variation of those values calls for an algorithm to identify the Maximum Power Point (MPP), which provides the maximum possible power given the environmental conditions and is known as Maximum Power Point Tracking (MPPT). This article proposes an MPPT algorithm based on Kalman filter, which is a widely applied computational method for engineering applications, in the environment MatLab/Simulink with the model of Advanced Solar Wind Power API 150 and simulated variations of temperature and solar irradiation. The achieved results show the efficiency of the proposed model, given that the relative errors were lower than 4%.