A High EIIiciency Piezoelectric Energy Harvesting

System
Xuan-Dien Do, Chang-Jin Jeong, Huy-Hieu Nguyen, Seok-Kyun Han, and Sang-Gug Lee
Department oI Electrical Engineering
Korea Advanced Institute oI Science and Technology
Deajeon, South Korea
diendxkaist.ac.kr


Abstract-nowadays, harvested energy from surrounding
environment plays an important role in the human life. This
green energy gradually replaced for traditional energy such as
fossil energy. Several methods have been used to capture green
energy from environmental source. One of the most popular
method is using piezoelectric material to harvest energy from
vibration source. A piezoelectric energy harvesting system
include two sections: a transducer to convert potential energy to
the electrical energy and an electrical interface to manage this
energy. Normally, a rectifier and voltage regulator are two main
components in the electrical interface. In this paper, a new high
efficiency piezoelectric energy harvesting system is proposed to
increase extracted power from piezoelectric. By using two
synchronized switches, the extracted efficiency of the rectifier is
double. Furthermore, the passive diode of the conventional
rectifier is replaced by active diode to increase the conversion
efficiency of rectifier. The simulation result show that the power
extraction efficiency of the rectifier is 3.5 times that of the
conventional full bride rectifier, and more than 93 of power
conversion efficiency can be achieved. To completely piezoelectric
energy harvesting system a Low-drop regulator (LDO) is used to
regulate voltage at the output of rectifier. The LDO gets
maximum 90 efficiency with 3mV voltage ripple. The overall
efficiency of proposed system gets 83.3.
Keywords- AC-DC converter, LDO converter, piezoelectric
energy harvesting system.
I. INTRODUCTION
Energy harvesting becomes more and more important in
our liIe. Energy is harvested Irom ambient environment such as
mechanical, thermal, light, electromagnetic, human body, and
etc to replace traditional sources. Mechanical energy harvesting
is the most promising oI several energy harvesting techniques:
it uses piezoelectric (PE) components that transIers the
vibration energy to the electrical energy. This electrical energy
can be regulated and stored beIore using by the electronic
devices where the replacement oI the batteries is impractical,
such as the wireless micro sensor networks, implementable
medical electronic, and tire pressure sensor system|1|.
Fig.1 shows a general piezoelectric energy harvesting
which consists oI Iive major components |2-4|. A transducer is
a sensor transIerring vibration energy into electrical energy.
The transducer is usually modeled by a current source in
parallel with a capacitor and a resistor|1,2,4,5|. The electrical
energy at the output oI the transducer is strong and irregular
Iunction oI time; hence, the AC-DC is need to produce a DC
supply source. The energy aIter rectiIier is stored in the energy
storage such as battery or supper capacitor. BeIore using in
load, normally a voltage regulator is needed to regulate suitable
voltage.
A rectiIier is the most regular AC-DC converter, which has
been proposed and demonstrated in recent work|1-6|. There are
two type oI conventional rectiIier: Iull bridge rectiIier and
voltage doubler. The limitations oI the conventional
architecture low extraction eIIiciency, and low conversion
eIIiciency. The conventional rectiIiers obtain low extraction
eIIiciency because it has to charge and discharge internal
capacitor each halI oI cycle|1,2,5|. To improve the extraction
eIIiciency, |2,5| uses the synchronized switch to reset capacitor
when current source cross zero. However, to control the
synchronized switch, |2,5| have to use the complex control
scheme to detect when the current source cross zero, and have
to use the external negative voltage to detect when the diode
change the status. The detection is very important because it
directly eIIect to signal control the switches. The changing
status oI switches directly impact to the perIormance oI
rectiIier. To Iurthermore increase extracted eIIiciency, parallel
or series synchronized switch harvesting on inductor (SSHI)
rectiIier use one external inductor to Ilip voltage across the
transducer internal capacitor when the current source cross
zero|1,2,6|. However to get signiIicant extracted eIIiciency, the
parallel or series SSHI rectiIier requires big inductor (~200uH),
it is impossible to design integrated chip.
The other direction oI increasing harvested energy is
improving the conversion eIIiciency. The conversion eIIiciency
origins oI voltage drop in each passive diode oI rectiIier. A
cross couple architecture is simple, however it gets high
conversion eIIiciency because two passive diode are replaced
by active diodes|7|. However the two remaining diodes are still
passive diodes. To complete the active diode rectiIier, |7|
This work was sponsored the ETRI SoC Industry Promotion Center's
Human Resource Development Project Ior IT SoC Architect; the CAD tools
were supplied by IDEC oI KAIST
Transducer
Energy
Converter
Energy
Storage
Voltage
Regulator
Load
Harvesting circuit

Figure 1. A Piezoelectric energy harvesting system

ISOCC 2011 978-1-4577-0711-7/11/ 26.00 2011 IEEE -389-

replaces two passive diodes by active diodes, thereIore the
voltage drop in each diode is only ,J
as
,.


To improve conversion eIIiciency, in this paper the new
rectiIier use the pMOS cross coupled rectiIier with two active
diode based comparator. Furthermore, to increase the
extraction eIIiciency two synchronized switches are added to
reset capacitor when the current source cross zero to get double
harvested energy.
To regulate output voltage oI rectiIier, normally DC-DC
converter is used|2,8|. However, the extracted power oI the
rectiIier is small about 100uW, thereIore the circuit required
the optimum power consumption Ior rectiIier, voltage regulator
and control circuit. |2,8| using the DC-DC converter Ior
regulated voltage regulator, the eIIiciency oI the system
signiIicant reduces because oI power consumption Ior DC-DC
converter. Furthermore, one external inductor is used Ior buck
or boost DC-DC converter. In this paper, a simple LDO is used
to the regulate voltage Ior load.
II. ARCHITECTURE AND CIRCUIT IMPLEMENTATION
A. Structure ana Opreration Principle of Proposea Rectifier
As shown in part oI Fig.2, a PE transducer is usually
modeled as a sinusoidal current source t f I t i
P P P
2 sin ) ( ,
in parallel with a capacitor, C
P
, and a resistor, R
P
, The
magnitude oI the PE current, I
P
, varies with the mechanical
excitation level oI the PE element, though it is assumed to be
relatively constant regardless oI the external loading; and f
P
is
the excited Irequency oI the PE harvester |1|. The output oI the
transducer is the AC voltage, which needs to be converted to
DC by an AC-DC rectiIier beIore it can be transIerred to the
battery or supper capacitor. In the Fig.2, the transducer is
connected to the proposed rectiIier which includes pMOS cross
coupled (M
P2
, M
P1
), two active diodes (COM1M
N1
,
COM2M
N2
), and two synchronized switches (M
P3
, M
P4
). The
pMOS cross coupled rectiIier reduces drop voltage oI two
passive diode Irom thread voltage oI diode (about 0.5 to 0.7V)
to the voltage across pMOS (,J
DS
, 5mV). Two remain passive
diode are replaced by active diode based comparator. The
replacement also signiIicant reduces drop voltage across in
each diode.
The operational principle oI the active pMOS cross coupled
rectiIier is illustrated in |7|. In the proposed rectiIier, two
transistor M
P3
and M
P4
is added to the pMOS cross-coupled
rectiIier, which operate as synchronized switches. This
switches are ON in the short time when current source cross
zero to connect both oI A and B to J
rect
. Fig.3 shows the
waveIorm oI the proposed rectiIier. In each halI cycle oI
current source, i
P
, J
BA
increases Irom 0 to +Jrect, then when
J
BA
reaches +Jrect, the current Ilows to output and J
BA
is kept
constant until current source cross zero. The voltage at G1(J
G1
)
and G2(J
G2
) change status Irom low to high during the current
lows to the output, and return again to low when current source
cross zero as shown in Fig.3. Two synchronized switches are
turned ON in the short time when the current source cross zero
to reset voltage across the internal capacitor. AIter resetting
capacitor, the J
BA
backs to zero, and begins charging in the
opposite direction. Resetting capacitor help the current source
does not need discharge Ior internal capacitor Irom +J
rect
to
zero such as conventional Iull bridge rectiIier|1,2,5|. The
maximum extracted power oI the proposed rectiIier can be
given by|5|:
2
max
2
OC P P
J f C P
Where
P P
P
oc
f C
I
J
2
is open voltage oI the
transducer|1|. By resetting internal capacitor on time when
transducer internal current source cross zero, the proposed
I
P
C
P
M
P1
M
P2
M
N2
M
N1
A
B
J
rect
G
2
G
1
M
P4 M
P3
S S
R
P
Transducer
COM2 COM1

Figure 2. Proposed active cross-coupled rectiIier with synchronized switches

V
BA

t
t
t
V
G2
t
t
V
G1
S
-Vrect
Vrect
`
Figure 3. The wave Iorm oI the proposed rectiIier
NOR INV INV INV INV
NOR INV
G1
G2
S
ti

Figure 4. Digital control circuit

ISOCC 2011
-390-

rectiIier can be extracted double to compare with cross coupled
active rectiIier |2|.
One oI the most important in the rectiIier with
synchronized switches is signal that uses to control the
switches. To generate control signal, |2,5| using the external
tuning and used external negative voltage. In the proposed
rectiIier, a simple control scheme is proposed with high exact.
Fig.4 shows the digital control block with the G
1
, G
2
input and
S
output. The output signal
S
turns ON two switches M
P3
and
M
P4
when the current source cross zero to reset the internal
capacitor. The proposed control scheme is simple and eIIective.
The power consumption oI the control scheme block is small
about 1uW.
B. Structure ana Operational Principle of the Proposea
Energy Harvesting System.
Fig. 5 shows the architecture oI proposed energy harvesting
system. In which the proposed rectiIier transIers energy Irom
transducer to the external energy storage, then this energy is
regulator by voltage regulator. The load is assumed as one
resistor, R
Load
, in parallel with one capacitor, C
2
. The big
problems oI the oI the regulator Ior piezoelectric energy
harvesting system is power consumption oI regulator, and
using external inductor. To overcome this problem, in this
paper, the LDO is used to regulate output voltage. The LDO is
implemented by one comparator and one pMOS transistor as
shown in Fig.5. The wanted output voltage is put into the non-
inverting input port oI comparator, and the inverting input oI
the comparator is connected to the load output voltage (J
O
).
The output oI comparator control the switch M
1
. When the
output voltage (J
O
) is smaller than wanted voltage (J
ref
), the
M1 is turned ON and the energy transIers Irom C
1
to C
2
. Vice-
versa when the output voltage is equal wanted voltage the M1
is OFF, and the energy Irom the rectiIier only changes to the
capacitor C1.
III. SIMULATION RESULTS
The proposed rectiIier was simulated with the Iollowing
transducer parameters: I
P
300 A, f
P
200 Hz, C
P
130 nF, and
R
P
on and the load resistor is
rectiIier (proposed rectiIier without synchronized switch)
provides 81 uW maximum output power while the theoretical
calculator power is 87.5 uW. The proposed rectiIier provides
166uW maximum output power while the theoretical
calculation power 175uW. These results indicate a power
conversion eIIiciency oI 92.6. The proposed rectiIier provide
maximum output power 1.95 times larger than cross coupled
active rectiIier.
Fig. 6 shows the comparison output voltage among
convention Iull bridge rectiIier, proposed rectiIier with and
without synchronized switches in the same load conditional oI
Ip Cp kp
Ln 1ransducer
kect|f|er
Vrect
Comp
k|oad
C1 C2
Vo
J
ref

Figure 5. Proposed piezoelectric energy harvesting system.

Time (s)
0.0 0.2 0.4 0.6 0.8 1.0
0.0
0.5
1.0
1.5
2.0
Conventional FB rectifier
Cross coupled active rectifer
Proposed rectifier
Figure 6. Output voltage oI cross coupled rectiIier with (proposed) and
Time (s)
1.000 1.005 1.010 1.015 1.020
-3
-2
-1
0
1
2
3
Proposed rectifier
Cross-coupled active rectifier

Figure 7. Transient signal at the input oI rectiIier with and without
synchronized switches.

Time (s)
0.0 0.2 0.4 0.6 0.8 1.0
0.0
0.2
0.4
0.6
0.8
1.0
1.2
1.4
Output voltage

Figure 9. Output voltage oI piezoelectric system
ISOCC 2011
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19K. Because oI signiIicant voltage drop in the passive diode
the cross-coupled active rectiIier output voltage increases
signiIicant Irom 0.5V to 1.2V. Furthermore, by adding 2
synchronized switches, the proposed rectiIier can get more
output voltage oI 1.8V. In this same conditional output load,
the conventional rectiIier extracts 13uW. The cross coupled
active rectiIier can extract 76uW, meanwhile proposed rectiIier
can obtain 166uW.
Fig.7 shows the waveIorm oI the input signal oI the cross
coupled active rectiIier and proposed rectiIier. In comparison
between the cross coupled rectiIier, the voltage across the
internal capacitor is reset two time in each cycle when the
current source cross zero. Because oI that, the proposed
rectiIier can get double extracted energy to compare with
proposed rectiIier without synchronized switches.
The wanted output voltage is setup oI 1.3V. Fig. 8 shows
the output oI the piezoelectric energy harvesting system. The
deviation oI the output voltage is 3mV. Fig. 9 shows the load
regulation oI the LDO. The output voltage derivation is 30 mV
when the load current change Irom 5uA to 10 mA. The
maximum eIIiciency oI the LDO is 90. The overall eIIiciency
oI systems is 83.3.
The proposed system is implemented in 0.18 CMOS
technology. Fig. 10 shows the layout oI the energy harvesting
system. The chip layout occupies an active area oI 0.20mm x
0.36mm.
IV. CONCLUSION
This paper has identiIied problems that exist with a rectiIier
that use a piezoelectric energy harvesting system. The
proposed rectiIier overcomes the drawback oI previous
rectiIiers. When two synchronized switches is used, the
voltage across the internal capacitor is reset to extract more
power. The pMOS cross coupled is used to reduce the
threshold voltage oI the passive diode. Two remain rectiIier is
implemented by one comparator and one transistor.
Furthermore, a new control scheme simpliIies the control oI
the switches in the proposed circuit. The proposed rectiIier
achieves a power extraction eIIiciency that is 3.5times that oI
conventional Iull-bridge rectiIier under same load condition; it
also achieves a power conversion eIIiciency oI more than 92.
To complete the piezoelectric energy harvesting system, the
LDO is used to regulate output voltage. With simple and high
eIIiciency oI regulator voltage. The overall eIIiciency oI the
piezoelectric system is 83.3.

REFERENCES

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Time (s)
1.000 1.005 1.010 1.015 1.020
O
u
t
p
u
t

v
o
l
t
a
g
e

(
V
)
1.292
1.294
1.296
1.298
1.300
1.302
1.304
1.306
1.308
1.310
1.312
Time (s)
1.000 1.005 1.010 1.015 1.020
L
o
a
d

C
u
r
r
e
n
t

(
m
A
)
0
10

Figure 9. Load regulation oI LDO

Figure 10. The layout oI the proposed energy harvesting system
ISOCC 2011 - 392 -