This thesis investigates the effect of the ripple current on the output power of solar cells. A solar panel with several metal halide lamps is set up to emulate the photovoltaic power system, which is cascaded by a boost converter and a buck-boost converter to extract triangular and trapezoidal currents, respectively. All experiments are operated under the room temperature with different current ripples and frequencies. The measured current and voltage waveforms at the output powers indicate that the dynamic characteristics are very different from static ones obtained from the dc loads. It is found that the output voltage lags the current when the peak of the rippled current goes beyond the maximum power point (MPP), leading to a declination in the average output power. This phenomenon becomes more severe for a higher peak, lower frequency, and larger charge of the rippled current exceeding the MPP. In addition, the declination in the average power may cause a shift of the MPP.

Massive deployment of wireless IoT (Internet of Things) devices makes replacement or recharge of batteries expensive and impractical for some applications. Energy harvesting is a promising solution, and various designs are proposed to harvest power from ambient resources including thermal, vibrational, solar, wind, and RF sources. Among these ambient resources, AC powerlines are a stable energy source in an urban environment. Many researchers investigated methods to exploit this stable source of energy to power wireless IoT devices. The proposed circuit aims to harvest energy from AC powerlines with a wide input range of from 10 to 50 A. The proposed system includes a wake-up circuit and is capable of cold-start. A buck-boost converter operating in DCM is adopted for impedance matching, where the impedance is rather independent of the operation conditions. So, the proposed system can be applied to various types of wireless sensor nodes with different internal impedances. Experimental results show that the proposed system achieves an efficiency of 80.99% under the powerline current of 50 A. / M.S. / Nowadays, with the magnificent growth of IoT devices, a reliable, and efficient energy supply system becomes more and more important, because, for some applications, battery replacement is very expensive and sometimes even impossible. At this time, a well-designed self-contained energy harvesting system is a good solution. The energy harvesting system can extend the service life of the IoT devices and reduce the frequency of charging or checking the device. In this work, the proposed circuit aims to harvest energy from the AC power lines, and the harvested power intends to power wireless sensor nodes (WSNs). By utilizing the efficient and self-contained EH system, WSNs can be used to monitor the temperature, pressure, noise level and humidity etc. The proposed energy harvesting circuit was implemented with discrete components on a printed circuit board (PCB). Under a power line current of 50 A @ 50 Hz, the proposed energy harvesting circuit can harvest 156.6 mW, with a peak efficiency of 80.99 %.

Cette thèse propose principalement, un algorithme État-Flow MPPT basé P&O, amélioré avec deux degrés de liberté, dans lequel le système événementiel (MPPT) de comportement est modélisé par le décrivant en terme de transition entre les états, sous certaines conditions. Secondairement, un algorithme étendu MPPT, base d'exploitation en parallèle de l'état-débit est en outre proposé d'être une solution difficile pour le contrôle indépendant du système hybride, où la caractéristique de contrôle continu peut se présenter au cours d'un certain état de travail tout en discrète, est indiquée le long des transitions d'état. Deux configurations possibles pour le système hybride sont proposées : deux convertisseurs DC/DC séparés, et un convertisseur de sortie unique à double entrée (DISO) de configurations. Enfin, il est proposé, un comportement du système DC modélisation utilisant État-Flow, menant à l'ensemble de la conception de la stratégie de commande qui concernent RES MPPT, RES et la coordination BESS, la stabilité du système d'alimentation et de régulation de la tension du bus DC. La simulation et les résultats expérimentaux valident l'efficacité et l'applicabilité de l'algorithme proposé. Les deux résultats montrent la supériorité du MPPT basé proposé État-Flow pour réduire les oscillations de puissance RESs à l'état d'équilibre dans diverses conditions d'exploitation, en plus de son démarrage plus rapide, et l’opération de transition sans divergence de la MPP, selon des conditions météorologiques variables. / This thesis primarily proposes, an improved P&O based State-Flow MPPT algorithm featuring two degree of freedom, in which the event driven system (MPPT) behaviour is modelled by describing it in terms of transitions among states under certain conditions. Secondarily, an extended parallel operating State-Flowbased MPPT algorithm is further proposed to be a challenging solution for the independent control of the hybrid system, where continuous control characteristic can present during a certain working state while discrete one is indicated along state transitions. Two possible configurations for the hybrid system are proposed; two separate DC/DC converters and dual input single output converter (DISO) configurations. Finally it is proposed, DC system behaviour modelling using State-Flow leading to the whole control strategy design which concern RESs MPPT, RESs and BESS coordination, power system stability and DC bus voltage regulation.Simulation and experimental results validate the effectiveness and applicability of the proposed algorithm, both results show the superiority of the proposed State-Flow based MPPT in reducing the RESs power oscillations at steady-state in various operating conditions in addition to its faster start-up and transition operation without divergence from the MPP during sudden varying weather conditions.

Ultra low power wireless sensors and sensor systems are of increasing interest in a variety of applications ranging from structural health monitoring to industrial process control. Electrochemical batteries have thus far remained the primary energy sources for such systems despite the finite associated lifetimes imposed due to limitations associated with energy density. However, certain applications (such as implantable biomedical electronic devices and tire pressure sensors) require the operation of sensors and sensor systems over significant periods of time, where battery usage may be impractical and add cost due to the requirement for periodic re-charging and/or replacement. In order to address this challenge and extend the operational lifetime of wireless sensors, there has been an emerging research interest on harvesting ambient vibration energy. Vibration energy harvesting is a technology that generates electrical energy from ambient kinetic energy. Despite numerous research publications in this field over the past decade, low power density and variable ambient conditions remain as the key limitations of vibration energy harvesting. In terms of the piezoelectric transducers, the open-circuit voltage is usually low, which limits its power while extracted by a full-bridge rectifier. In terms of the interface circuits, most reported circuits are limited by the power efficiency, suitability to real-world vibration conditions and system volume due to large off-chip components required. The research reported in this thesis is focused on increasing power output of piezoelectric transducers and power extraction efficiency of interface circuits. There are five main chapters describing two new design topologies of piezoelectric transducers and three novel active interface circuits implemented with CMOS technology. In order to improve the power output of a piezoelectric transducer, a series connection configuration scheme is proposed, which splits the electrode of a harvester into multiple equal regions connected in series to inherently increase the open-circuit voltage generated by the harvester. This topology passively increases the rectified power while using a full-bridge rectifier. While most of piezoelectric transducers are designed with piezoelectric layers fully covered by electrodes, this thesis proposes a new electrode design topology, which maximizes the raw AC output power of a piezoelectric harvester by finding an optimal electrode coverage. In order to extract power from a piezoelectric harvester, three active interface circuits are proposed in this thesis. The first one improves the conventional SSHI (synchronized switch harvesting on inductor) by employing a startup circuitry to enable the system to start operating under much lower vibration excitation levels. The second one dynamically configures the connection of the two regions of a piezoelectric transducer to increase the operational range and output power under a variety of excitation levels. The third one is a novel SSH architecture which employs capacitors instead of inductors to perform synchronous voltage flip. This new architecture is named as SSHC (synchronized switch harvesting on capacitors) to distinguish from SSHI rectifiers and indicate its inductorless architecture.