GROUP MEMBERS

AMNA BUKHARI 144

SALMAN NAWAZ 067
ALI HAMZA 060

SUBMITTED TO
Sir Mozam Ali

SUN TRACKING
SOLARPANEL
Dual axes
 SUN TRACKER SYSTEM
INTRODUCTON:
The biggest crisis we face is climate change due to overuse of fossil fuels, and the only solution to
overcome these problems is to use renewable energy. Renewable energy is a type of energy
obtained from nature without any negative impact on the environment. One of the most prominent
types of renewable energy is solar energy. Solar radiation is collected by solar modules and
converted into electrical energy. The electrical energy supplied depends on the amount of sunlight
that hits the solar panel. Solar trackers produce more power in roughly the same area as fixed-tilt
systems, making them ideal for land-use optimization. A tracking system will help us get the most
energy during these peaks.
In addition to tracking stations, the project also includes an educational component. The tracking
system requires manual overrides so that the instructor can steer the solar panels in the desired
direction. The system should also display the power output of each individual solar cell to show
the efficiency at each angle. There are also disadvantages such as moving parts and gears that
require regular maintenance.
Ability to manually rotate the tracker along the entire ecliptic using a controller. A solar tracker is
a device used to align a photovoltaic panel, reflector, lens, or other optical device with the sun. As
the position of the sun in the sky changes with the season and time of day, trackers are used to
orient collection systems to maximize energy production.
There are two types of sun trackers single axes and dual axes. In this project we are making dual
axis sun tracker. The device which tracks the sun to collect more energy. Dual axes tracking has 2
degrees which mean they have both horizontal and vertical axis. Solar panel which is directly
perpendicular to the sun produces more power. Dual axis solar tracker is better than single axis
solar panel because it has 40% more efficiency than that of single axis. Dual axes collect sun
energy from east, west, south, and north angles. They function on two axes ‘primary and
secondary’ one axis helps to move from east to west and another helps to move from North to
South.
Also, dual axis has higher degree of accuracy in directional pointing, higher degree of flexibility.
Fully automatic, put the panel in front of the sun until you can see it. A unique feature of this
system is the use of the Sun as a guiding source instead of the Earth as a reference. An active
sensor constantly monitors the sunlight and rotates the panel in the direction that maximizes the
intensity of the sunlight.
Related Working:
Detecting the position of the Sun:
Measure the light intensity at the LDRs using an Arduino and compare the intensity of the light
hitting LDRs. Here, the LDR acts as a photodetector. Also known as a photoresistor. It is a light
sensitive device. This project uses four of his LDRs to detect sunlight. Then, send a signal to the
Arduino to give a signal to the servo motor to move based on the amount of light from the LDR.
Strong light hitting the right LDR will rotate the panel to the right, and strong light on the left will
slowly rotate the panel to the left.

Figure 1.2

Imagine a beautiful winter morning scenario. Since the sun rises in the east, the
intensity of the light is higher than in the west, which moves the panel to the east.
The panels are oriented west because they track the sun during the day and by
evening the sun moves westwards, giving it more intensity than it does east.

Dual Axis Motion

Sunlight consists of two components: direct light, which produces about 90% of the sun's energy,
and diffuse sunlight, which carries the rest. Diffusivity increases with clear skies and
proportionally with cloudy days. In the traditional design of a two-axis solar tracking system,
motion is transferred to the panel using two of his linear actuators.
 Figure 1.3 Dual axis rotating solar panel.

Project Implementation

COMPONENTS REQUIRED
 1 x Arduino Uno
 2 x Servo motor
 1 x Solar panel
 4 x LDR
 4 x 10k Resistor
 Jumper wires
 1 x MDF board

Arduino Uno:
The Arduino Uno is an open-source microcontroller board based on
Microchip. The board has a set of digital and analog input/output (I/O) pins
that can be connected to various expansion boards and another circuitry.

Solar Panel:
A collection of photovoltaic modules, a 20W solar panel is the main
component of the system, which is why it converts solar energy into electrical
energy.

Servo Motor:
A servo motor is used to rotate the solar panel. We use servo motors because
we can precisely control the position of the solar panels and cover the entire
path of the sun. It uses a servo motor that runs on 5 volts.
Light Dependent Resistor (LDR):
Light dependent resistors are very sensitive to light as they are composed
of semiconductor materials with light sensitive properties. The resistance
of an LDR changes with light and is inversely proportional to light
intensity. That is, the resistance of an LDR increases with high intensity
light and vice versa.

Schematics and Connection of the Solar Tracker

Connecting the circuit is very easy. Here, I used an Arduino Uno as the controller and connected
four LDRs to analog pins A0, A1, A2, and A3 respectively. Arduino pins 9 and 10 are connected
to the servo motors. Since we used 4.8v to 6.8v servo motors, we can easily power all the
components from the Arduino itself, so no external power supply is required. All connections are
shown in the figure below:

Figure 1.4 Schematic diagram

Assembling the Solar Tracker:
 The first step before assembling the solar tracker is to build the base. The structure of the
base uses MDF board. The first step is to cut and create a rectangular piece of MDF board.
 The next step is to attach the solar panel to the servo motor. This requires an L-shaped
fixture. Use a piece of wood for this.
 Next, the LDR needs to be installed on the other side of the solar panel. To do this, we
glued the LDR to the panel. Next, we need to connect a 10k resistor to LDR and connect
the other side of the resistor to ground. These act as pull-down resistors. The LDR's second
pin is directly connected to the 6V output.
 We connected the output of each LDR to Arduino pins A0, A1, A2, and A3.
 The next step is to connect the servo motors. A servo motor has three wires. Ground, Vin,
signal wire.
 We connected the Vin pin to 5 volts on the Arduino, ground to common, and the signal
wires to pins 9 and 10 on the Arduino. That's it for the circuit.

Figure 1.5 Hardware

Let’s see how does the code works:
The full code for this project is at the bottom of this page. The first step before writing any code is
to download the servo library. To control servo movement, you need the Servo Library. A step-
by-step description of the program follows.

 First, we linked the Servo library, created a Servo object and named it "Servo".

 This section is to store the servo position. We set the range of servo by giving low and
high limits (20-150 degrees)

 Here, we have assigned the analogue pins A0, A1, A2 and A3 pins for LDR and declared
the variables for sensor values.

 In the section, we have defined the servo pin as pin 10

 In the loop section, first step is to read the LDR values using the analogue read function of
Arduino.

 In this part, we calculate average of LDRs.

  Use this condition to rotate the solar panel up & down i.e., controller compare LDRs
values, according to that it moves the panel.

Project Analysis:
Environmental Sustainability Innovations in the Energy Industry and Sun Trackers for Large
Corporations, Startups, and Their Adoption Trends. These insights help you make informed
strategic decisions to achieve a more lasting competitive advantage. Quality Capability Delivery
is a way of translating user requirements into design quality. This comparison helps determine
which of the following technical design requirements are most important: The global solar tracker
market size is estimated at USD 8.9 billion in 2021 and is projected to reach USD 16 billion by
2031, growing at a CAGR of 6.1% from 2022 to 2031.

Figure 1.7 Graph representation

Additionally, growing interest in sustainable energy is driving the expansion of the global solar
tracker market. The significant increase in the number of solar panel installations worldwide is one
of the key factors driving the growth of the solar tracker market. Additionally, the solar tracker
market is growing due to the passage of beneficial government legislation supporting numerous
solar energy projects. Companies are focusing on manufacturing advanced technology-based
products as the industrial demand for advanced equipment for tracking increases. For example, in
June 2021 Soitec unveiled his SFOne solar tracker for high performance modules. It is designed
to work with 78 and 72 cell modules and is self-powered by the module, reducing running costs.

Figure 1.8
 Practical application:
There are many applications of sun tracker system.
 The most common uses of solar trackers are positioning
photovoltaic (PV) panels (solar panels) so that they remain
perpendicular to the sun's rays, and space telescopes so that
the direction of the sun can be determined. is to place The
PV Solar Tracker orients the solar panel to the position of
the sun in the sky. By keeping the panel perpendicular to
the sun, more sunlight hits the solar panel, less light is
reflected, and more energy is absorbed. This energy can
be converted into electricity.
 Several factors should be considered when deciding to use
a tracker. Some of these are the solar technology used, the
amount of direct sunlight, the feed-in tariff in the region
where the system is deployed, and the cost of installing
and maintaining the tracker.

Conclusion:
Conclusion In the construction and operation of the proposed solar tracker system, the sun was not
always tracked based on illumination. This prevents our device from consuming energy
unnecessarily and shuts down our system at night.
Solar energy is playing an increasingly important role in the search for more efficient and
sustainable energy sources. To make the most of this energy source, solar cells must be able to
follow the sun all year round. Solar tracking systems are expensive and even more accurate.
Our project was a great success. The technological solution to make our solar system more efficient
has been fully achieved. The tracker tracked the sun well, had a 180-degree range of motion, and
met all the technical.
A major problem with the use of solar energy is that its availability varies greatly over time. Solar
power can be limited due to the sun's day/night cycle and the earth's orbit around the sun. This is
where Solar Tracker is gaining ground in the solar system industry.
This technical implementation allows the tracker to move solar panels to catch up with the sun
every hour and minute of the day, thus generating more energy. This ensures that the angle of the
solar panel to the sun is always optimized, increasing the actual power production. Compared to a
fixed PV system, tracker technology provides 15-25% additional power output, depending on
installation location. Due to the nature of the system, it tracks the sun at any point between dawn
and dusk.
It helps to generate maximum power generation from the same solar panels used for fixed ground
installations. The use of solar tracking systems is becoming more popular as it allows the developer
to make the most of the available land by reducing his DC capacity but producing more power.
The dual-axis solar tracker seems like an amazing new development in the solar segment. All
Earth's tracker uses GPS and wireless technology to track the arc of the sun across the sky
throughout the day. result? Collects 45% more energy than traditional rooftop solar systems.
In the long term, the use of positioning systems is expected to grow significantly. With PV
installations increasing worldwide, the future of solar trackers looks very promising. Solar tracker
installations are expected to reach 3-4 GW by the end of 2020, and the global solar tracker market
is expected to reach $6.83 billion by 2022.

References:
[Link]
[Link]
[Link]/science/article/pii/S1364032117313953
[Link]
[Link]
[Link]
CODE:
1. #include <Servo.h>
2. Servo servohori; //horizontal servo (BOTTOM SERVO)
3. int servoh = 0; //assign servo at 0 degree
4. int servohLimitHigh = 150; //maximum range of servo is 180 degree(it is variable you can also
change)
5. int servohLimitLow = 20; //minimum range of servo is 10 degree(it is variable you can also
change)
6. Servo servoverti; //vertical servo(TOP SERVO)
7. int servov = 0;
8. int servovLimitHigh = 160;
9. int servovLimitLow = 10;
10.
11. int ldrtopr = 1; //top right LDR A1 pin
12. int ldrtopl = 2; //top left LDR A2 pin
13. int ldrbotr = 0; // bottom right LDR A0 pin
14. int ldrbotl = 3; // bottom left LDR A3 pin
15. void setup ()
16. {
17. [Link](10); //horizontal servo connected to arduino pin 10
18. [Link](10);
19. [Link](9); //vertical servo connected to arduino pin 9
20. [Link](10);
21. delay(500); //delay
22. }
23. void loop()
24. {
25. servoh = [Link]();
26. servov = [Link]();
27. int topl = analogRead(ldrtopl); //read analog values from top left LDR
28. int topr = analogRead(ldrtopr); //read analog values from top right LDR
29. int botl = analogRead(ldrbotl); //read analog values from bottom left LDR
30. int botr = analogRead(ldrbotr); //read analog values from bottom right LDR
31. [Link](topl);
32. [Link](",");
33. [Link](topr);
34. [Link](",");
35. [Link](botl);
36. [Link](",");
37. [Link](botr);
40. int avgtop = (topl + topr) / 2; //average of top LDRs
41. int avgbot = (botl + botr) / 2; //average of bottom LDRs
42. int avgleft = (topl + botl) / 2; //average of left LDRs
43. int avgright = (topr + botr) / 2; //average of right LDRs
45. if (avgtop < avgbot)
46. {
47.
48. if (servov > servovLimitHigh)
49. {
50. servov = servovLimitHigh;
51. [Link](servov);
52. }
53. else{
54. [Link](servov -1);
55. }
56. }
57. else if (avgbot < avgtop)
58. {
59. if (servov < servovLimitLow)
60. {
61. servov = servovLimitLow;
62. [Link](servov);
63. }
 64. else{
65. [Link](servov +1);
66. }
67. }
68. else
69. {
70. [Link](servov);
71. }
72.
73. if (avgleft > avgright)
74. {
75. if (servoh > servohLimitHigh)
76. {
77. servoh = servohLimitHigh;
78. [Link](servoh);
79. }
80. else{
81. [Link](servoh -1);
82. }
83. }
84. else if (avgright > avgleft)
85. {
86. if (servoh < servohLimitLow)
87. {
88. servoh = servohLimitLow;
89. [Link](servoh);
90. }
91. else{
92. [Link](servoh +1);
93. }
94. }
95. else
96. {
97. [Link](servoh); // write means run servo
98. }
99. delay(50);
100. }
101.