Open- and Short-Circuit Fault Identification for a Boost dc/dc Converter in PV MPPT Systems

This paper proposes a fault identification system for short and open-circuit switch faults (SOCSF) for a dc/dc converter acting as a Maximum Power Point Tracker (MPPT) in Photovoltaic (PV) systems. A closed-loop operation is assumed for the boost dc/dc converter. A linearizing control plus a Proportional-Derivative (PD) controller is suggested for PV voltage regulation at the maximum power point (MPP). In this study, the SOCSF are modeled by using an additive fault representation and the fault identification (FI) system is synthesized departing from a Luenberger observer. Hence, an FI signal is obtained, which is insensitive to irradiance and load current changes, but affected by the SOCSF. For FI purposes, only the sensors used in the control system are needed. Finally, an experimental evaluation is presented by using a solar array simulator dc power supply and a boost dc/dc converter of 175 W in order to validate the ideas this study exposes.