Photovoltaic power plant source measurement system for fault detection

Abstract

This paper describes a novel system for the monitoring of the string segment of a photovoltaic (PV) power plant. The design of the monitoring device is intended for future use in the detection of arc faults and the tracking of long-term degradation of the solar panels. The primary benefits of such a system are expected to be enhanced safety and simplified maintenance for existing PV installations. The monitoring system is based on the Texas Instruments C2000 platform, which performs all measurements and also acts as Modbus RTU server to propagate the results. To facilitate the installation on existing PV power plants, a G3-PLC modem has been used to transfer measurements to a data acquisition system without any need for extra communication wires. A prototype of the proposed device has been constructed and demonstrated to function under laboratory conditions.