Monitoring the operation of an isolated photovoltaic (PV) system needs both data loggers and web transfer to collect the sensor data. The data includes the measurement of the voltage and current of the PV system and for local weather. The PV system in Memorial University of Newfoundland (MUN) is 5 m away from the window, where the weather data is collected. In reality, PV systems are approximately 25–50 m away from the weather sensors. It is, therefore, more meaningful to realize the sensor communications by wireless transfer than long cables, which can significantly reduce the cables of a large PV system with long distances among sensors. The PC receives all the sensor data and transfers hem to a web server (Thingspeak). A web server is applied to monitor the operation of the system instead of a local server when its users are far away from the location, even though the local server allows more frequent data logging (once per second). The data transformation between the PC and the web server must guarantee the stability and robustness of the program. The system alarm that reports the disconnection failure is also necessary to notify the users. This paper will first introduce the general system setup, then present each part of the system in detail, and finally, analyze the collected data.

In some rural areas in the northwest of China, people are suffering from not only the voltage drop due to long distance transmission but also the power outages due to remoteness and poorly maintained grid. In recent few years, the price of solar energy has been reduced drastically every year in China due to the government policy on renewable energy. In the near future, isolated hybrid power systems for home use could be affordable and used by residences in these rural areas. Thus, it is necessary to design a hybrid power system based on local load and weather condition to check system feasibility and expected performance. It includes load simulation, system sizing, and dynamic system modeling and simulation. This paper firstly introduces current development of renewable energy in China and then goes through the sizing, modeling, and simulation of the system design for a typical remote home in China and finally discusses the system's availability based on the simulation results. In this paper, the NASA website is the source for weather data, and BEopt is used to generate load data. During system modeling, the MPPT algorithm is much simpler designed than the complex incremental method. A soft starter is adopted with the diesel generator for stability. The charge controller of the battery storage provides external command to the MPPT and diesel PID controller to prevent the battery storage from overcharging. The rms value of the fundamental load voltage is used in the voltage control loop of the inverter.