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US 9,960,729 B2Granted
Solar tracker, sun tracking method, solar power generator, and controller
AssigneePanasonic Intellectual Property Management Co., Ltd.
InventorsRyutaro Futakuchi, Masaki Yamamoto
Life of this patent
Estimating the term…
Abstract
A solar tracker comprises: a measuring section which measures the quantity of electric power generated by a solar panel; a solar position getting section which gets information about the theoretical solar position; a driving section which changes the orientation of the solar panel; a dither control section which measures a solar position; a positional shift measuring section which measures a solar positional shift between the measured solar position and the theoretical solar position. The driving section corrects the theoretical solar position based on the estimated attitude error and controls the orientation of the solar panel based on the theoretical position corrected.
Claims15
A solar tracker comprising:
- a supporting mechanism configured to support a solar panel so as to change an orientation of the solar panel, the solar panel including a concentrating photovoltaic generator module which generates electric power using sunlight received;
- a measuring section which measures a quantity of electric power generated by the solar panel;
- a solar position getting section which gets information about a theoretical solar position at an arbitrary point in time defined by azimuth and elevation angles;
- a driving section which changes an orientation of the solar panel so that a normal to a solar collector plane of the solar panel tracks the sun;
- a dither control section which is connected to the driving section and which performs a dither operation by changing the orientation of the solar panel so that the normal to the solar panel scans a predetermined range determined to include the theoretical solar position obtained by the solar position getting section;
- a positional shift measuring section which measures a measured value of a solar positional shift between a measured solar position to be determined based on a distribution of quantities of electric power generated by the solar panel that have been measured by the measuring section during the dither operation and the theoretical solar position;
- and
- an attitude error estimating section which gets an estimated attitude error of the supporting mechanism based on the measured value of the solar positional shift and which updates the estimated attitude error based on a respective degree of reliability of the measured value of the solar positional shift and the estimated attitude error, the estimated attitude error being defined by rotations of three-dimensional orthogonal coordinates of the supporting mechanism with respect to reference three-dimensional orthogonal coordinates,
- wherein the driving section corrects the theoretical solar position based on the estimated attitude error that has been updated and controls the orientation of the solar panel based on the theoretical position corrected, and
- the degree of reliability of the measured value is determined based on the distribution of the quantities of electric power generated by the solar panel that have been measured.
7 more elements
A method for estimating the attitude error of a solar tracker, the method comprising the steps of:
- setting up a supporting mechanism on a base, the supporting mechanism supporting a solar panel, including a concentrating photovoltaic generator module which generates electric power using sunlight received, so as to change an orientation of the solar panel;
- getting information about a theoretical solar position at an arbitrary point in time defined by azimuth and elevation angles;
- performing a dither operation by changing the orientation of the solar panel so that a normal to the solar panel scans a predetermined range determined to include the theoretical solar position;
- measuring a quantity of electric power generated by the solar panel during the dither operation, determining a measured solar position based on a distribution of quantities of electric power generated that have been measured, and measuring a value of a solar positional shift between the measured solar position that has been determined and the theoretical solar position;
- and
- getting an estimated attitude error of the supporting mechanism based on the measured value of the solar positional shift and updating the estimated attitude error based on a respective degree of reliability of the measured value of the solar positional shift and the estimated attitude error, the estimated attitude error being defined by rotations of three-dimensional orthogonal coordinates of the supporting mechanism with respect to reference three-dimensional orthogonal coordinates.
3 more elements
A program stored in a non-transitory computer-readable recording medium executed by a computer for controlling a solar tracker, the program being configured to make the solar tracker perform the steps of:
- getting information about a theoretical solar position at an arbitrary point in time defined by azimuth and elevation angles;
- performing a dither operation by changing an orientation of a solar panel so that a normal to a solar collector plane of the solar panel, including a concentrating photovoltaic generator module which generates electric power using sunlight received, scans a predetermined range determined to include the theoretical solar position;
- measuring a quantity of electric power generated by the solar panel during the dither operation, determining a measured solar position based on a distribution of quantities of electric power generated that have been measured, and measuring a value of the solar positional shift between a measured solar position that has been determined and the theoretical solar position;
- and
- getting an estimated attitude error of the supporting mechanism based on the measured value of the solar positional shift and updating the estimated attitude error based on a respective degree of reliability of the measured value of the solar positional shift and the estimated attitude error, the estimated attitude error being defined by rotations of three-dimensional orthogonal coordinates of the supporting mechanism with respect to reference three-dimensional orthogonal coordinates.
2 more elements
Dependencies are inferred from the claim text.