Omnidirectional wind piezoelectric energy harvesting

Abstract

A novel energy harvester based on vortex-induced vibration (VIV) of the sphere and piezoelectric effect is proposed to efficiently gather wind energy from all horizontal directions. An elastically-supported foam sphere is vertically arranged and considerably oscillates in the cross-flow direction when the wind speed is in the lock-in region. A piezoelectric beam is attached to the supported sphere by a spring and deforms periodically around the original buckling state, thereby converting kinetic energy into electrical energy. Experimental studies are performed to assess the power output of the harvester when exposed to wind flows with varying directions and speeds. The omnidirectional wind flow is divided to 12 orientations with the interval angle of 30°, and the wind speeds range from 1.17 m/s to 7.87 m/s. The testing findings indicate that the harvester has excellent consistency in both lock-in region and average power for various wind azimuths. When the wind direction is changed from 0° to 360°, the peak average power changes from 179.8 μW to 247.5 μW, and the wind speed region where the sphere undergoes vibration changes from 2.58 m/s"~" 7.05 m/s to 2.58 m/s"~" 7.87 m/s. Following that, the effects of the length of the supporting spring and the diameter of the sphere on the output average power and lock-in region are investigated experimentally. Finally, a demonstration of powering a wireless sensing node is performed to show applications of the designed energy harvester in windy conditions.

A multi-directional and multi-modal galloping piezoelectric energy harvester with tri-section beam

“…The experiment demonstrated that the prototype had an extended range of incident wind directions. Zhang et al [22] and Meng et al [23] established a novel spherical bluff body to scavenge the wind energy from multiple directions based on VIV. Although the above mentioned VIV-based harvesters could work in different directions, they only performed effectively in a narrow wind speed range (lock-in region), restricting their efficiencies and outputs.…”

Performance study of an array piezoelectric energy harvester for pressure pulsation vibration energy in water hydraulic system

“…The piezoelectric energy harvesting technology, a common method of sustainable clean energy from the external environment, provides idea for power supplying of sensors in water hydraulic system. It is widely used in the field of wind energy [6,7], tidal energy [8], water energy [9,10] and mechanical vibration [11] due to its high energy conversion efficiency, wide applicability and stability. On the other hand, pressure pulsation often occurs in the pipeline of water hydraulic system, which can cause vibration and noise, but also exhibits huge vibration energy harvesting potential [12,13].…”

Analytical model of z-piezoelectric energy harvester for power generation from human physical activities

“…The present work aims at clean and free power generation at macro-scale using piezoelectric harvesters. The various sources for piezoelectric power generation are human motion , Song et al 2019, Zhang et al 2021, Sirigireddy and Eladi 2022a, vehicular movement (Ansari and Karami 2015, Yang et al 2017, Khalili et al 2022, mechanical vibrations (Roundy andWright 2004, Grzybek andMicek 2019), flow-induced vibrations (Wang et al 2021, Zhang et al 2023, bridge oscillations (Zhang et al 2022) etc. The mechanical energy from these sources are converted into electrical energy using a PEH.…”