Optimization of Neurons Number in Artificial Neural Network Model for Predicting the Power Production of PV Module

Abstract

In this work, an Artificial Neural Network (ANN) with a backward-propagation technique was used to predict the power generation of the Photovoltaic (PV) module in weather conditions of Baghdad city-Iraq. Experiment tests were investigated in the summer of 2022. Three weather parameters, including: (solar radiation, ambient temperature, and wind speed), the output electrical characteristics of the PV module (voltage, current, power), and module temperature (were measured. Therefore, the dataset of the ANN system consists of four input and one output parameter. Furthermore, the structure of ANN includes a single hidden layer with a backward propagation technique. The main goal of this study was to optimize the number of neurons in the training process. The evaluation of the ANN model depended on the determination coefficient (R) and Root Mean Squared Error (RMSE).  The obtained results show that the architecture of ANN is appropriate for predicting the power generated from the PV module. The developed ANN model has good accuracy. Where the MSE is 0.002747 at epoch 9 in the model. Furthermore, the R is recorded as 0.99078, 0.98254, 0.99125, and 0.99005 for training, testing, validation, and all respectively in the proposed model. In addition, the optimization number of neurons in the hidden layer gave sufficient accuracy without referring to the choice of the number of neurons by using the trial-and-error method that most researchers relied.