Power Control Optimization of an Underwater Piezoelectric Energy Harvester

Abstract

Abstract:Over the past few years, it has been established that vibration energy harvesters with intentionally designed components can be used for frequency bandwidth enhancement under excitation for sufficiently high vibration amplitudes. Pipelines are often necessary means of transporting important resources such as water, gas, and oil. A self-powered wireless sensor network could be a sustainable alternative for in-pipe monitoring applications. A new control algorithm has been developed and implemented into an underwater energy harvester. Firstly, a computational study of a piezoelectric energy harvester for underwater applications has been studied for using the kinetic energy of water flow at four different Reynolds numbers Re = 3000, 6000, 9000, and 12,000. The device consists of a piezoelectric beam assembled to an oscillating cylinder inside the water of pipes from 2 to 5 inches in diameter. Therefore, unsteady simulations have been performed to study the dynamic forces under different water speeds. Secondly, a new control law strategy based on the computational results has been developed to extract as much energy as possible from the energy harvester. The results show that the harvester can efficiently extract the power from the kinetic energy of the fluid. The maximum power output is 996.25 µW and corresponds to the case with Re = 12,000.

Oscillating U-Shaped Body for Underwater Piezoelectric Energy Harvester Power Optimization

“…The mechanism presented in the current study is connected with the work of Cottone et al [39] and on the computational fluid dynamics simulations of Aramendia et al [40]. This device, which is intended to be used inside water pipelines of 2–5 inches of diameter, contains a piezoelectric beam assembled to an oscillating body, as shown in Figure 2.…”

“…Additionally, a volumetric control has been designed to refine the mesh around the body and to keep a y+ value less than 1. The mesh dependency study of the previous work of Aramendia et al [40] was used to verify the accuracy of the solution.…”

“…A detailed model of the dynamics of an underwater piezoelectric energy harvester system is presented in the work of Aramendia et al [40]. The selection of the optimal parameters during the design process of the harvester enables maximizing the power generated by the harvesting system.…”

A Review on Mechanisms for Piezoelectric-Based Energy Harvesters

“…They obtained outputs on the order of 10 −10 W, which is not useful for most electronic devices [177]. Optimization of this design by playing with the Re of the fluid has been done by Aramendia et al, obtaining energy generation up to 0.9 mW for Re = 12,000 [178]. Flapping-leaf or flag-shaped piezoaeroelastic energy harvesters are of great interest for many researchers.…”

“…[178] Underwater aeroealstic energy harvester from a heavy flag that can generate power on the order of 10 −10 W at 0.6-1.1 ms −1 fluid flow.…”