Design and control of an innovative electronic load for the photovoltaic module characterization

The paper proposes a new electronic load setup for a fast, low-cost and standard-compliant characterization of a photovoltaic module. The approach is based on the use of a DC-DC converter, exploiting its ability to emulate a resistor. In particular, a Buck-Boost converter topology is employed. The model is implemented in the Simulink/SimPower System environment. A commercial PV Conergy E215P photovoltaic module is used in order to evaluate the performances of the proposed electronic load and to validate the proposed approach.