Project Description:

In September 2007, Akamina began to work with Varisolar - an Ottawa-based solar energy start-up company. The objective of the company was to develop technology that could be used in northern latitudes to efficiently harvest solar energy. Akamina's role in the project was to develop an overall strategy to control and manage large-scale solar farms.

Deliverables:

• Low-level and high-level control strategies
• Identify motor control hardware and algorithms for solar tracking
• Identify options for creating a network between low-level controllers and high-level solar farm control systems
• Investigate inverter options and how they would be integrated into a solar farm control strategy

Technologies:

• Methods for solar power extraction
• 1-D and 2-D solar tracking
• CANbus and ZigBee for controller networking
• DC motor control
• Inverters

Click here to link to Varisloar's web site.