ECE.17 – Maximum Power Point Tracking Controller
Team Members Heading link
- Asiah Aleiali
- Elaine Gracia
- Vishesh Patel
- Ali Shaban
Project Description Heading link
The world is facing an energy and environmental crisis due to the depletion of fossil fuels and use of wood, which are historically the primary source of energy for cooking and other domestic purposes. The use of fossil fuels has caused health issues to arise as the inhalation of the byproduct is very dangerous to human health and influences climate change. This has led to exploration of alternative energy sources, such as solar energy, which is abundant and sustainable The use of a solar stove will particularly help third world countries who primarily use wood to cook and often spend approximately twenty-Five percent of their income on fuel. A challenge is to maximize the energy output from the solar panel in an inexpensive manner, commercial maximum power point tracking controllers are too expensive for our target market. The input from the solar panel will fed to our MPPT that will ensure the maximum amount of power is being extracted from the solar panels. The use of an MPPT will keep efficiency of the whole system high and allow for more hours of cooking and limited auxiliary energy use. Our team has tested and improved a low cost MPPT circuit that can be implemented for these systems.