Experimental Verification of Different Photovoltaic Array Configurations under Partial Shading Condition

The goal of this paper is to compare the performances of different photovoltaic (PV) array configurations under partial shading condition (PSC) theoretically and experimentally. The theoretical comparison has been done by using MATLAB programming and for experimental comparison thirty two commercially available PV modules have been utilized. The programming and experimental results of different PV array configurations: Series (S), Parallel (P), Series-Parallel (SP), Total-Cross-Tied (TCT), Bridge-Linked (BL), Honey-Comb (HC) and hybrid configurations: Series Parallel-Total Cross Tied (SPTCT) and Bridge Linked-Total Cross Tied (BLTCT) under uniform irradiance condition (UIC) and PSC corresponding to a particular shading pattern with and without bypass diodes have been tabulated. The performances of all these configurations have been compared by employing their maximum powers, fillfactors and relative power losses for a particular shading pattern.