Performance Analysis of A Light Sensor-Based Dual-Axis Solar Tracking System for Supporting Dragon Fruit Irrigation and Supplemental Lighting

Abstract

Dragon fruit needs extra light at night to flower out of season but using normal grid electricity is very expensive for remote farmers. Solar panels offer a clean solution but fixed panels often lose a lot of sunlight. This research aims to design and test a 2 kW solar panel system with a dual axis sun tracker and a 10 kWh battery to supply farm loads without grid power. The study uses a white box simulation model in MATLAB Simulink. The system is tested under extreme heavy rain weather using NASA POWER data for January 2026. The power loads include a 300 W water pump working for two hours a day and a 1200 W plant lamp working for four hours at night. The simulation results show the system produces a total of 290.45 kWh of energy and the farm uses 167.50 kWh. The dual axis tracker helps catch 25 to 30 percent more energy than fixed panels. The battery also performs very well with the lowest remaining power level at 41.92 percent. Because the battery never reaches its lowest safe limit the chance of a power blackout is exactly zero percent. In conclusion this off grid agrivoltaic prototype is highly reliable to keep dragon fruit farms productive in bad weather even though the initial cost needs further economic study.