Development of an effective MPPT method suitable to a stand-alone, low-cost wind turbine system

This paper presents a theoretical study and an experimental analysis of a stand-alone, low-cost wind turbine system proposed to be used in rural and remote areas, implementing the maximum power point tracking (MPPT) with the Hill-Climb Searching (HCS) control via Perturb and Observe(P&O) method. In order to prove how effective the MPPT was for a low-cost wind turbine suitable to be installed in rural areas, the proposed system was first simulated and then the results were compared with experimental data obtained by tests measuring the system functionality and MPPT capability under the same conditions. The implemented MPPT method was validated varying both the wind speed and the time interval corresponding to each wind speed to observe the transient behavior.