Piezoelectric Vibration-Based Energy Harvesting Enhancement Exploiting Nonsmoothness

Abstract

Piezoelectric vibration-based energy harvesting systems have been used as an interesting alternative power source for actuators and portable devices. These systems have an inherent disadvantage when operating in linear conditions, presenting a maximum power output by matching their resonance frequencies with the ambient source frequencies. Based on that, there is a significant reduction of the output power due to small frequency deviations, resulting in a narrowband harvester system. Nonlinearities have been shown to play an important role in enhancing the harvesting capacity. This work deals with the use of nonsmooth nonlinearities to obtain a broadband harvesting system. A numerical investigation is undertaken considering a single-degree-of-freedom model with a mechanical end-stop. The results show that impacts can strongly modify the system dynamics, resulting in an increased broadband output power harvesting performance and introducing nonlinear effects as dynamical jumps. Nonsmoothness can increase the bandwidth of the harvesting system but, on the other hand, limits the energy capacity due to displacement constraints. A parametric analysis is carried out monitoring the energy capacity, and two main end-stop characteristics are explored: end-stop stiffness and gap. Dynamical analysis using proper nonlinear tools such as Poincaré maps, bifurcation diagrams, and phase spaces is performed together with the analysis of the device output power and efficiency. This offers a deep comprehension of the energy harvesting system, evaluating different possibilities related to complex behaviors such as dynamical jumps, bifurcations, and chaos.

Real-Time Implementation of a New MPPT Control Method for a DC-DC Boost Converter Used in a PEM Fuel Cell Power System

“…During the last few years, several clean energy sources such as solar, wind, geothermal etc., have been developed to generate electric energy and replace conventional fuel [1][2][3][4][5][6][7]. However, these alternative sources necessitate sophisticated and high-cost technologies, and they are not suitable for many applications.…”

A parametric analysis of the nonlinear dynamics of bistable vibration-based piezoelectric energy harvesters

“…In order to widen the bandwidth of the PEHs, several types of nonlinear systems have been proposed. Typical nonlinear PEHs depicted in the literatura are monostable or bistable piezoelectric buckled beams (Cottone et al, 2012; Liu et al, 2013, 2016, 2017; Qian et al, 2020), monostable and bistable piezomagnetoelastic systems (Erturk and Inman, 2011a; Paula et al, 2015; Sebald et al, 2011; Wang et al, 2018b), tristable piezomagnetoelastic systems (Haitao et al, 2015; Kim and Seok, 2015; Zhu et al, 2017), and nonsmooth systems with mechanical stoppers (Ai et al, 2019; Blystad and Halvorsen, 2011; Liu et al, 2012). Recent studies also show the development of quadstable and pentastable structures (Kim and Seok, 2014; Wang et al, 2018a; Zhou et al, 2017a, 2017b).…”

Tracking Control for Piezoelectric Actuators with Advanced Feed-Forward Compensation Combined with PI Control

“…PEAs are high precision positioning systems with a wide range of usage such as active vibration systems for vehicles [1], sensing [2], energy recovery [3] and stick-slip motors [4]. These devices not only are accurate but also possess a broad stiffness in comparison to their size [5].…”