• Advances in Computational Design
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• v.1 no.2
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• pp.155-173
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• 2016

This paper presents a method of design for the energy harvesting of a piezoelectric cantilever beam. Vibration modes have strain nodes where the strain distribution changes in the direction of the beam length. Covering the strain nodes of the vibration modes with continuous electrodes effects a cancellation of the voltages outputs. The use of segmented electrodes avoids cancellations of the voltage for multi-mode vibration. The resistive load affects the voltage and generated power. The optimum resistive load is considered for segmented and continuous electrodes, and then the power output is verified. One of the effective parameters on energy harvesting performance is the existence of concentrated mass. This topic is studied in this paper. Resonance and off-resonance cases are considered for the harvester. In this paper, both theoretical and experimental methods are used for satisfactory results.

• Journal of the Korean Institute of Electrical and Electronic Material Engineers
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• v.25 no.12
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• pp.943-948
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• 2012

A new water energy harvester module, which is composed of piezoelectric bimorph cantilevers, harvesting circuit and a shaft with 16 impellers at a center axis, was fabricated for energy harvesting application. High energy density $Pb(Zr_{0.54}Ti_{0.46})O_3$ + 0.2 wt% $Cr_2O_3$ + 1.0 wt% $Nb_2O_5$ (PZT-CN) thick film obtained by tape casting method was used for the bimorph cantilever. The PZT-CN bimorph cantilever with a proof mass of 49 g exhibited extremely high output power of 22.5 mW (24 $mW//cm^3$) at resonance frequency of 11 Hz. In addition, the fabricated water energy harvester has a cylindrical structure with 48 bimorph cantilevers clamped at inner surface. A significantly high output power of 433 mW was obtained at a rotation speed of 120 rpm with a resistive load of $500{\Omega}$ for the water energy harvester.

• Proceedings of the Korean Institute of Electrical and Electronic Material Engineers Conference
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• 2010.03a
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• pp.7-7
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• 2010

Energy harvesting from the environment has been of great interest as a standalone power source of wireless sensor nodes for Ubiquitous Sensor Networks(USN). In particular, the piezoelectric energy harvesting from ambient vibration sources has intensively researched because it has a relatively high power density comparing with other energy scavenging methods. Through recent advances in low power consumption RF transmitters and sensors, it is possible to adopt a micro-power energy harvesting system realized by MEMS technology for the system-on-chip. However, the MEMS energy harvesting system has some drawbacks such as a high natural frequency over 300 Hz and a small power generation due to a small dimension. To overcome these limitations, we devised a novel power generator with a spiral spring structure as shown in the figure. The natural frequency of a cantilever could be decreased to the usable frequency region (under 300 Hz) because the natural frequency depends on the length of a cantilever. In this study, the natural frequency of the energy harvester was a lower than a normal cantilever structure and sufficiently controllable in 50 - 200 Hz frequency region as adjusting weight of a proof mass. Moreover, the MEMS energy harvester had a high energy conversion efficiency using a shear mode ($d_{15}$) is much larger than a 33 mode ($d_{33}$) and the energy conversion efficiency is proportional to the piezoelectric constant (d). We expect the spiral type MEMS power generator would be a good candidate for a standalone power generator for USN.

• Journal of the Korean Institute of Electrical and Electronic Material Engineers
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• v.23 no.3
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• pp.250-259
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• 2010

The ability for energy harvesting via the piezoelectric effect was studied for a unimorph element such as piezo buzzer. A simple equivalent circuit was proposed to predict the energy generated based on the internal stress. Unimorphs with a metal-cavity were used as a driving device of the generation panel. Both the AC open voltage and DC output voltage as a function of pressure period and number of element were measured. For the unimorph generation circuit, DC output voltage varies with pressure period, reaching a maximum value at $470{\mu}F$. The maximum output voltage a according to load resistance was measured at $1M{\Omega}$. Data analysis of the DC output voltage and time constant indicated that number of piezoelectric element of optimum was 60~80. It was found that piezoelectric unimorph has the possibility to be used as the driving element of the electric generation.

• Journal of the Korean Institute of Electrical and Electronic Material Engineers
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• v.22 no.4
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• pp.360-365
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• 2009

On this paper, piezoelectric generators using piezoelectric ceramics were designed and fabricated. Generators were made by attaching cymbal type metal plates on upper and bottom sides of a disc type piezoelectric ceramic. Generator converts wasting mechanical energy to electrical energy. Output voltage was increased when thickness of ceramic and displacement of vibration were increased. Temperature of the ceramic was increased when it generates, but the temperature rising was saturated at certain temperature.

• Proceedings of the Korean Institute of Electrical and Electronic Material Engineers Conference
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• 2008.11a
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• pp.169-170
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• 2008

On this paper, piezoelectric generators using piezoelectric ceramics were designed and fabricated. Generators were made by attaching cymbal type metal plates on upper and bottom sides of a disc type piezoelectric ceramic. Generator converts wasting mechanical energy to electrical energy. Output voltage was increased when thickness of ceramic and displacement of vibration were increased. Temperature of the ceramic was increased when it generates, but the temperature rising was saturated at certain temperature.

• Journal of the Korean Institute of Electrical and Electronic Material Engineers
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• v.26 no.5
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• pp.355-359
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• 2013

In this paper, the $0.995(Li_{0.04}(Na_{0.56}K_{0.44})_{0.96}(Nb_{0.90}Ta_{0.10})_{0.998}Zn_{0.005}O_3+0.005KNbO_3+xwt%\;TeO_2$ lead-free piezoelectric ceramics for energy harvesting devices were fabricated by the conventional mixed oxide method. The microstructure, dielectric, and piezoelectric properties were investigated as a function of the $TeO_2$ addition. All the specimens showed an orthorhombic phase structure. At the composition ceramics doped with 0.1 wt%$TeO_2$, the optimum values of $d_{33}$= 212 pC/N, $d_{33}{\cdot}g_{33}=9.54pm^2/N$, and kp=0.448 were obtained, respectively. The results indicate that the composition ceramics is a promising candidate for energy harvesting devices applications.

• Ceramist
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• v.23 no.1
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• pp.54-88
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• 2020

Global effort has resulted in tremendous progress with energy harvesters that extract mechanical energy from ambient sources, convert it to electrical energy, and use it for systems such as wrist watches, mobile electronic devices, wireless sensor nodes, health monitoring, and biosensors. However, harvesting a single energy source only still pauses a great challenge in driving sustainable and maintenance-free monitoring and sensing devices. Over the last few years, research on high-performance mechanical energy harvesters at the micro and nanoscale has been directed toward the development of hybrid devices that either aim to harvest mechanical energy in addition to other types of energies simultaneously or to exploit multiple mechanisms to more effectively harvest mechanical energy. Herein, we appraise the rational designs for multiple energy harvesting, specifically state-of-the-art hybrid mechanical energy harvesters that employ multiple piezoelectric and triboelectric mechanisms to efficiently harvest mechanical energy. We identify the critical material parameters and device design criteria that lead to high-performance hybrid mechanical energy harvesters. Finally, we address the future perspectives and remaining challenges in the field.

• Transactions of the Korean Society of Mechanical Engineers A
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• v.39 no.5
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• pp.499-505
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• 2015

To properly design and assess a piezoelectric vibration energy harvester, it is necessary to consider the application of an efficiency measure of energy conversion. The energy conversion efficiency is defined in this work as the ratio of the electrical output power to the mechanical input power for a piezoelectric vibration energy harvester with an impedance-matched load resistor. While previous research works employed the electrical output power for approximate impedance-matched load resistance, this work derives an efficiency measure considering optimally matched resistance. The modified efficiency measure is validated by comparing it with finite element analysis results for piezoelectric vibration energy harvesters with three different values of the electro-mechanical coupling coefficient. New findings on the characteristics of energy conversion and conversion efficiency are also provided for the two different impedance matching methods.

• The Transactions of The Korean Institute of Electrical Engineers
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• v.66 no.10
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• pp.1540-1546
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• 2017

In piezoelectric device applications, it is important to improve a system efficiency because of the low generated power. In this paper, an optimal driving method is proposed to improve a system efficiency for a piezoelectric energy harvesting system. The proposed method considers disappear energy in input capacitors and the converter efficiency according to the input voltage magnitude to minimize energy losses. Experimental results based on various energy generation cases verify that the proposed method significantly improves the system efficiency; the efficiency is approximately 9.97% higher than that of the conventional method.