Cadmium Telluride Solar cell: From Device modeling to electric vehicle battery management

Battery charging in system level implementation for industrial and vehicular application charged by second generation thin film solar cells like CdTe can could have a promising future. These second-generation thin film solar cells are becoming popular for their cheaper production and better efficiency. Though the production of solar cells is still based mainly on silicon (Si), the market share of thin film solar has been increasing over the last few years [1]. The mathematical modeling of the voltage dependent current-voltage (I-V) characteristics of Cadmium Telluride (CdS/CdTe) Solar cell and utilizing that modeling mathematics in to circuit for electric vehicle standard battery charging have been analyzed in this paper. A single cell is developed based on the mathematical model and a solar module/network is constructed considering a series and parallel combinations of the single cell. The I-V characteristic of the cell is used as a source. Then the network response was analyzed under various operating conditions like intensity and temperate change. To extract the power from the solar cell, Perturb and Observe (P&O) Maximum power point technique has been used. Then a second converter driven with the developed charging algorithm is included. As the two control algorithms (MPP and battery charging) are working in the same system, mismatch between PV system and battery bank might happen [2]. The simple charging algorithm considering the both constant current and constant voltage mode and switching between these two modes when needed has been described.