• Smart Structures and Systems
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• v.19 no.1
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• pp.67-90
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• 2017

The interdisciplinary research area of small scale energy harvesting has attracted tremendous interests in the past decades, with a goal of ultimately realizing self-powered electronic systems. Among the various available ambient energy sources which can be converted into electricity, wind energy is a most promising and ubiquitous source in both outdoor and indoor environments. Significant research outcomes have been produced on small scale wind energy harvesting in the literature, mostly based on piezoelectric conversion. Especially, modeling methods of wind energy harvesting techniques plays a greatly important role in accurate performance evaluations as well as efficient parameter optimizations. The purpose of this paper is to present a guideline on the modeling methods of small-scale wind energy harvesters. The mechanisms and characteristics of different types of aeroelastic instabilities are presented first, including the vortex-induced vibration, galloping, flutter, wake galloping and turbulence-induced vibration. Next, the modeling methods are reviewed in detail, which are classified into three categories: the mathematical modeling method, the equivalent circuit modeling method, and the computational fluid dynamics (CFD) method. This paper aims to provide useful guidance to researchers from various disciplines when they want to develop and model a multi-way coupled wind piezoelectric energy harvester.

• Proceedings of the Korean Society for Noise and Vibration Engineering Conference
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• 2014.10a
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• pp.539-543
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• 2014

This work investigated the electromechanical performance of a cantilevered vibration energy harvester incorporating the single crystal PMN-PZT, manufactured with the most recent technology of solid-state single crystal growth. Single crystal PMN-PZTs with two different crystallographic axes such as [011] and [001] were considered. For the [011] orientation, because material properties such as the stiffness, piezoelectric strain coefficients are not the same in the directions normal to the crystallographic axis, the effects of the transversely anisotropy on the magnitude and frequency bandwidth of output power were also analyzed.

• Smart Structures and Systems
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• v.22 no.2
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• pp.133-137
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• 2018

Increasing interest in prognostics and health management has heightened the need for wireless sensor networks (WSN) with efficient power sources. Piezoelectric energy harvesters using Pb(Zr,Ti)O3 (PZT) are one of the candidate power sources for WSNs as they efficiently convert mechanical vibration energy into electrical energy. These types of devices are resonated at a specific frequency, which has a significant impact on the amount of energy harvested, by external vibration. Hence, precise prediction of mechanical deformation including modal analysis of piezoelectric devices is crucial for estimating the energy generated under specific conditions. In this study, an experimental vibrational system capable of controlling a wide range of frequencies and accelerations was designed to generate mechanical vibration for piezoelectric energy harvesters. In conjunction with MATLAB, the system automatically finds the resonance frequency of harvesters. A small accelerometer and non-contact laser displacement sensor are employed to investigate the mechanical deformation of harvesters. Mechanical deformation under various frequencies and accelerations were investigated and analyzed based on data from two types of sensors. The results verify that the proposed system can be employed to carry out vibration experiments for piezoelectric harvesters and measurement of their mechanical deformation.

• Smart Structures and Systems
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• v.14 no.2
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• pp.247-266
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• 2014

Conventional cantilevered piezoelectric energy harvesters (PEHs) are usually fabricated with continuous electrode configuration (CEC), which suffers from the electrical cancellation at higher vibration modes. Though previous research pointed out that the segmented electrode configuration (SEC) can address this issue, a comprehensive evaluation of the PEH with SEC has yet been reported. With the consideration of delivering power to a common load, the AC outputs from all segmented electrode pairs should be rectified to DC outputs separately. In such case, theoretical formulation for power estimation becomes challenging. This paper proposes a method based on equivalent circuit model (ECM) and circuit simulation to evaluate the performance of the PEH with SEC. First, the parameters of the multi-mode ECM are identified from theoretical analysis. The ECM is then established in SPICE software and validated by the theoretical model and finite element method (FEM) with resistive loads. Subsequently, the optimal performances with SEC and CEC are compared considering the practical DC interface circuit. A comprehensive evaluation of the advantageous performance with SEC is provided for the first time. The results demonstrate the feasibility of using SEC as a simple and effective means to improve the performance of a cantilevered PEH at a higher mode.

• Journal of the Korean Society of Manufacturing Process Engineers
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• v.18 no.7
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• pp.48-55
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• 2019

Soldiers have been exposed to the risk of chilblains in cold winters. Recent studies have described sensors and IOT devices that use independent power sources based on piezoelectric energy harvesting. Therefore, the heated shoes with an independent power source have been developed. For the application of energy harvesting to shoes, it is necessary to develop a unique harvester by considering human gait characteristics. Energy harvesters and ceramics were designed and fabricated in this study. The performances of these harvesters and ceramics were evaluated experimentally. Then, the harvesters and ceramics with superior performance were selected and applied to the system. Thereafter, the heating and charging performance of the system was tested under real walking conditions. The results show that the developed system can generate adequate energy to charge the battery and heat the shoes.

• Journal of Sensor Science and Technology
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• v.26 no.2
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• pp.107-113
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• 2017

Energy source of a piezo-electric harvester is vibration. Sources of vibration are machineries operated with high frequencies, constructions and people operated with low frequencies and etc. In this study, we tried to figure out power generation properties over vibrations upon angles of a piezo-cantilever for applying them to movements of the construction and/or people, which are vibration sources at low frequencies. A uni-morph cantilever with a $59mm{\times}29mm{\times}0.2mm$ piezo-electric element attached on a $71mm{\times}46mm{\times}0.25mm$ copperplate was used. A spring was attached to the lower side of the cantilever and a mass was attached on the opposite side. Also, a structure with a specific angle which is an angle in between the ground and the cantilever was prepared and then, connected to a spring or the cantilever. Then, this structure was divided into the A-type and B-type and excited in the direction of z- axis. After that, the angle between the ground and the cantilever was changed and excited by 1 to 10 Hz upon the existence of a spring and/or a mass to compare power generation properties.

• 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.24 no.5
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• pp.422-426
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• 2011

Piezoelectric materials can be used to convert mechanical energy into electrical energy. In this study, we investigated the possibility of harvesting from mechanical vibration force using a high efficient piezoelectric material-polyvinylidene fluoride (PVDF). A piezoelectric energy harvesting system consists of rectifier, filter capacitor, resistance. The experiments were carried out with impacting force to PVDF film with the thickness of 1 ${\mu}m$. The output power was measured with change in the load resistance value from 100 ${\Omega}$ to 2.2 $M{\Omega}$. The highest power was obtained under optimization by selection of suitable resistive load and capacitance. A power of 0.3082 ${\mu}W/mm^2$ was generated at the external vibration force of 5 N (10 Hz) across a 1 $M{\Omega}$ optimal resistor. Also, the maximum power of 0.345 ${\mu}W/mm^2$ was generated at 22 ${\mu}F$ and 1 $M{\Omega}$. The developed system was expected at a solution to overcome the critical problem of making up small size energy harvester.

• KSCE Journal of Civil and Environmental Engineering Research
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• v.31 no.4A
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• pp.287-293
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• 2011

This paper investigates the applicability of a piezoelectric cantilever for energy supply of wireless sensor node used in structural health monitoring of bridges. By combining the constitutive equation of piezoelectric material and the dynamic equation of cantilever structure, the coupled governing equation for cantilever equipped piezoelectric patches has been addressed in matrix form. Forced excitation tests were carried out to validate the numerical model and to investigate the power output characteristics of the energy harvester. From the numerical simulation based on the measured bridge accelerations under KTX, Saemaul, Mugunghwa trains, the peak powers generated from the device were found to be 28.5 mW, 0.65 mW, 0.51 mW respectively. It is revealed from the results that bridge vibrations caused by moving loads is not a practical source for energy harvesting because of its low acceleration level, low frequency and short duration.

• Smart Structures and Systems
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• v.24 no.3
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• pp.333-343
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• 2019

The possibility of adopting vibration-powered wireless nodes has been largely investigated in the last years. Among the available technologies based on the piezoelectric effect, the most common ones consist of a vibrating beam covered by electroactive layers. Another energy harvesting strategy is based on the use of piezoelectric strips attached to a hosting structure subjected to dynamic loads. The hosting structure, for example, can be the system to be equipped with wireless nodes. Such strategy has received few attentions so far and no analytical studies have been presented yet. Hence, the original contribution of the present paper is concerned with the development of analytical solutions for the electrodynamic analysis and design of piezoelectric polymeric strips attached to relatively large linear elastic structural systems subjected to random vibrations at the base. Specifically, it is assumed that the dynamics of the hosting structure is dominated by the fundamental vibration mode only, and thus it is reduced to a linear elastic single-degree-of-freedom system. On the other hand, the random excitation at the base of the hosting structure is simulated by filtering a white Gaussian noise through a linear second-order filter. The electromechanical force exerted by the polymeric strip is negligible compared with other forces generated by the large hosting structure to which it is attached. By assuming a simplified electrical interface, useful new exact analytical expressions are derived to assess the generated electric power and the integrity of the harvester as well as to facilitate its optimum design.