With the involvement of graduating engineering students, a remotely accessible solar energy laboratory has been developed, in order to simulate a small photovoltaic system. The laboratory includes two photovoltaic cells, a charge controller, batteries and a dummy load. A Raspberry PI microcontroller enables to control the different inputs, measures the voltages and the currents in the circuit and provides a remote access through the web. The lab intends to be a prototype of remote lab for the University, in terms of realization costs, communication protocols and software interface. It will be used by graduate students in the Electrical Engineering courses, enabling them to perform some experiments at distance.

Abstract-Remote laboratories are increasingly being used in academic courses, especially in science and engineering. New control systems allow the development of even complex experiments with a low cost. In this paper we present a remote laboratory that reproduces a small-scale photovoltaic system, including a solar panels and lights, a charge controller, a battery and a dummy load. A Raspberry PI microcontroller is used to send the different inputs to the laboratory, handling commands, measuring some electrical quantities and provide remote access via the web. The laboratory, developed with the involvement of graduating students, will be used in the Master courses of electrical engineering. Particular attention has been paid on the development of hardware and software, to use the developed laboratory as a model for the realization of other experiments.