A switched-capacitor DC-DC converter with voltage regulation for photovoltaic applications

In this paper, a new DC-DC switched-capacitor converter with the potential of output voltage regulation is presented for photovoltaic applications. The proposed topology consists of an extended high voltage gain converter along with a buck converter. The extended high voltage gain converter is operated with a fixed conversion gain whereas the buck converter is controlled to do the maximum power point tracking (MPPT) which is an important advantage of proposed structure. The most important benefits of the proposed structure are approximately continuous input current, reduction of the number of power electronic switches and costs. A comparison with other similar structures is given to show the merits of the proposed topology. The operation of proposed converter is verified using experimental results.