Solar power is the future of renewable power generation. The problem with solar panels is that they use up a lot of space on rooftops or open areas and are difficult to mount, maintain and clean regularly. Additionally, the solar panels are moved as per sun position can generate up to 40% more solar power. We here by propose a new kind of solar panels that can be mounted on water bodies like lake pools so that they don’t occupy any land space. Additionally, we introduce an innovative sun tracker and panel movement system using dual axis mechanism to move the solar panels as per sun position and generate more power. This project makes use of an onboard computer, which is commonly termed as micro controller. It acts as heart of the project. This onboard computer can efficiently communicate with the output and input modules which are being used. The controller is provided with some internal memory to hold the code. This memory is used to dump some set of assembly instructions into the controller. And the functioning of the controller is dependent on these assembly instructions This project consists of few SUN light sensors (LDR) and a motorized mechanism for rotating the panel in the direction of sun. Microcontroller based control system takes care of sensing sunlight and controlling the motorized mechanism using DC motors. This system works continuously without any interruption. The main controlling device of the whole system is a Microcontroller. Solar panel, L293D, four LDRs, limit switches are interfaced to Microcontroller. To perform this intelligent task, Microcontroller is loaded with an intelligent program written using embedded ‘C’ language.

 

The main objectives of the project are:

• Tracking sun direction.
• Automatic starting the system in the morning from start point.
• DC motor-controlled movement of solar panel.
• Easy to clean solar panels using Lake/pool Water.
• Does not occupy space on land.
• Efficiently floats on water 24 Hours.

  The major building blocks of this project are:  

1. Regulated Power supply.
2. Charging Circuit.
3. Rechargeable Battery.
4. Solar Panel.
5. PIC Microcontroller.
6. Sun light Sensor to sense the sun direction.
7. Motorized mechanism to control the position of solar panel.
8. LED Indicators.
9. Limit switches.

  Software’s used:  

1. PIC-C compiler for Embedded C programming.
2. PIC kit 2 programmer for dumping code into Microcontroller.
3. Express SCH for Circuit design.

 

Regulated power supply:    

 

Block Diagram:    

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