Design of a Photovoltaic Power Management System for a Forest Fire Surveillance UAV

Abstract: This report presents an implementation for power system utilizing photovoltaic (PV) cells intendedfor an unmanned aerial vehicle (UAV). The system design aims to achieve perpetual flight during sunhours by optimizing PV-cell performance and storing excess energy in a battery. The proposedimplementation is based around having two parallel DC-converters connected to the PV array, oneconnected straight to the load and another to the battery. Thus providing the option to charge thebattery separately, use the battery as a occasional aid or completely isolate it from the circuit.Finding lightweight components that are able to handle high nominal currents has proven to bemore difficult than anticipated. However, the control loop and system architecture presented in thisreport has shown good overall performance in terms of efficiency, speed and battery management.