Smart-roads: Piezoelectric

Transducers For Energy

Harvesting
Umesh R
Vijaykumar M H
Sreedharkumar S R
Guided by: Dr. Venkatesh Vadde

PES Institute of Technology - ECE

Contents

Background and motivation

Goals and deliverables
Summary of Achievements
Observations and calculations
Challenge encountered
Applications of PEH Systems
Limitations in PEH system
Conclusions

PES Institute of Technology - ECE

Background & Motivation

Electricity demand far surpasses supply, and any sources of
energy harvesting are very desirable
Human actions, Kinetic energy of vehicles and ambient vibration
are present every where in the environment they can be
converted into useful energy
Piezoelectric transducers are used as sensors in many applications
Piezoelectricity can be used as an energy harvesting mechanism
Motivation behind piezoelectric energy harvesting is to power
mobile devices without batteries, to control low power embedded
systems etc.
Piezo-energy harvesting (PEH) from moving vehicles can power
many kinds of systems

Road warnings
Ad-billboards
Street lamps control
Traffic lights

PES Institute of Technology - ECE

Goals & deliverables

A practical characterization of PEH-potential from
commonly available piezoelectric transducer
elements
An interface circuit to condition the voltage and
store the energy generated
Quantification of energy storage potential
(practically seen) in controlled & random
experiments
Demo of smart road applications powered by the
harvested energy from the PEH setup

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Summary of Achievements
Using simple, inexpensive piezo-transducers we
demonstrated energy harvesting and storage
Designed a bridge rectifier circuit array to maximize
the pulsed voltage output
Optimized a sensor mounting mechanism for best
voltage generation
Demonstrated scaling of PEH systems from 4 discs to
16 discs all the way to 104 discs
Discovered that vibrational mode of PEH is more
effective than compressive mode
Designed a suitable voltage regulation circuit to
stabilize the pulsed voltage output of the PEH system
PES Institute of Technology - ECE

Study on piezoelectric elements

Soft cushion needed under discs for producing
bending stress and hence better yield
Stacking the discs is not useful as the ceramic
used in the disc is brittle. Also there are chances
of shorting of the terminals.
Using a single piezo-disc, for a normal finger
pressure we could produce about 15C of charge
These discs when placed on vibrating materials,
produce higher energy.

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Block Diagram
Interface Circuit
Piezoelectri
c
Transducers
[Piezo
element]

Strai
n
Rectifie
r

Filter

Regulat
or

Waveforms
at various
stage

Battery
Storage

Low power
Embedded Systems
[Road warnings,
Traffic lights control,
Ad boards]

Waveforms
observed

PES Institute of Technology - ECE

List of tasks completed

Selection of piezoelectric transducers among available
transducers
Suitable arrangement to bring out a soft cushion effect
for discs
An experimental setup with 1,2,4,8 and 16 piezo-discs
to show the scaling
Quantization of charge stored on capacitor
A better interface circuit to produce constant 5V
output
A larger PEH system with 104 piezo-discs to charge a
Ni-MH battery
Applications in smart roads using harvested energy
PES Institute of Technology - ECE

Soft cushion for better yield

Strai
n

Piezo buzzer

Foam
Tape or
rubber

This arrangement produces soft cushion effect

for better deformation of the transducer.
Also by this way large strain could be handled
without breakage of ceramic in the discs.
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Interface Circuit

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Scaling with number of piezo-discs

Scale
(number of piezoelectric discs)

Time (s) to charge capacitor with no load

120

65

35

20

16

Tabulation of time to charge 100F cap to 10V

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Voltage (V)

Scaling with number of steps

No. of steps
Tabulation of voltage at 100Fcapacitor vs. number of steps
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Energy stored (mJ)

Energy stored in capacitor

No. of steps
Tabulation of energy stored in 100Fcapacitor vs. number of steps
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Capacitor voltage vs. Regulated

DC Output time
Voltage(V) at 1000F
cap

Time(s)

47

12

111

16

162

20

158

Voltage(V) at 100F
cap

Time(s)

11

12

16

16

18

20
18
Time duration of 5V, 50A Regulated DC output provided by MAX666 IC
for various capacitor voltages
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Larger PEH system

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Challenges faced and solutions

found
Connecting discs in parallel results in deformation in other discs.
Connecting discs in series adds up voltage but, when the strain is
not synchronized subtraction happens.
Solution: Connecting rectifier for each piezo-disc.
Now series combination does not work because when one of the
disc is not deformed it results in open circuit.
Parallel connection works Capacitor is charged when any of the
disc is deformed irrespective of synchronization.
Voltage drop in rectifier diodes is considerable i.e. 0.6+0.6=1.2V
Solution: Using diode 1N5817/18/19 results in voltage drop of just
0.15+0.15=0.3V

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Challenges faced and solutions

found

PES Institute of Technology - ECE

Challenges faced and solutions

found

Use of linear regulators like IC7805 leads to more power

dissipation
Solution: Using MAX666 IC , a micro power voltage regulator
which is more efficient and can produce a constant stable
output for a particular duration

Vibrations produce more energy, but to convert the strain of

vehicles into vibrations at discs a complex setup is required

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Applications
Road lines and road signs illumination at night
efficiently
Efficient road lamp switching to save power (Only
when a vehicle approaches light glows)
Approximate measure of weight of the vehicles
Measurement of speed of vehicles

PES Institute of Technology - ECE

Limitations of current PEH system

Piezoelectric transducers are high impedance
(low current) sources of power
PEH system to provide continuous output power
requires higher density of vehicles which cannot
be guaranteed
The ceramic piezoelectric material is brittle
Rather than strain, vibrations produce more
energy. To achieve vibrations we need a complex
setup

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Conclusions
Developed a modular, scalable PEH mat that can be
deployed on roads, corridors, elevators as smart
solution
Piezoelectric energy harvested is best suitable for
low power, embedded, programmable applications
PEH system works in any weather condition
compared to solar energy which depends on weather
Many smart road applications can be realized using
piezoelectric energy harvesting:
Intelligent traffic control
Intelligent street lighting
Cautionary flash-signs
PES Institute of Technology - ECE

References

http://www.piezocryst.com/piezoelectric_sensors.php
www.innowattech.co.il
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Energy_harvesting#Piezoelectri
c_energy_harvesting
www.designboom.com/technology/intelligent-interactivehighway-by-studio-roosegaarde-heijmans/

http://www.americanpiezo.com/knowledge-center/piezotheory.html
http://ieeexplore.ieee.org/xpl/articleDetails.jsp?
arnumber=6145389
www.fusionteq.com/html/battery_101_-_the_basics.html

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Thank You