Interleaved Switched-Inductor Boost Converter for Photovoltaic Energy Application

This study proposes a two-phase switched-inductor DC–DC converter with a voltage multiplication stage to attain high-voltage gain. The converter is an ideal solution for applications requiring significant voltage gains, such as integrating photovoltaic energy sources to a direct current distribution bus or a microgrid. The structure of the introduced converter is comprised of an interleaved switched-inductor boost stage attached to the voltage multiplier cells stage. The interleaved switched-inductor consists of two switched-inductor phases controlled by two out-of-phase controllable switches. The switched-inductor stage can be fed by single or multiple self-controlled input power sources. The voltage multiplier networks are comprised of diodes and capacitors to raise the converter’s voltage gain. Several advantages are gained using the proposed converter such as, reduced potential stress on switching elements, the continuity of the source current, and the modularity of both the switched-inductor and the voltage multiplier stages. In addition, the modularity of the proposed converter improves the scalability, in which the voltage gain can be increased by connecting additional voltage multipliers or switched-inductor cells. The theory of operations of the presented converter, component selection, and steady-state calculations are explained in detail. The simulation results support the theoretical investigation and verify the hardware implementation of a 400 W experimental prototype to convert 20.0 V from an input voltage source to a 400.0 V output load.