Yokogawa, WT3000
New firmware adds MPPT functionality to digital power analyser
News Release from:
Yokogawa Europe BV - European Test & Measurement Centre
16 July 2010
New firmware (Version 4.12) has been introduced for the Yokogawa WT3000 digital power analyser that enables the instrument to be used to carry out real-time dynamic measurements on maximum power point tracking (MPPT): a system used to optimise the power performance of solar or wind energy inverter systems under changing conditions.
The new firmware is of particular significance in situations where the maximum power point is subject to rapidly changing environmental conditions, such as solar cells on orbiting satellites or wind turbines under conditions of variable velocity and direction of wind.
The dynamic and nonlinear nature of such systems means that conventional methods of measuring average power and peak power do not produce a meaningful result: instead, it is the instantaneous peak power that is significant, requiring a high performance digital power analyser to show how efficiently the inverter system is responding to the changing conditions.
The new firmware allows a number of user-defined parameters such as peak power, instantaneous power and power factor to be calculated from acquired measurements and made available in real time for storage and display purposes.
