Journal
ENERGY CONVERSION AND MANAGEMENT
Volume 138, Issue -, Pages 30-37Publisher
PERGAMON-ELSEVIER SCIENCE LTD
DOI: 10.1016/j.enconman.2017.01.049
Keywords
Thermoelectric energy conversion; Low-voltage; Energy harvesting; Wireless sensor nodes
Categories
Funding
- China Science Foundation [11202176]
- Innovation and Technology Commission of Hong Kong Special Administrative Region, China [ITS/248/14FP]
Ask authors/readers for more resources
A thermoelectric energy harvesting system designed to harvest tens of microwatts to several milliwatts from low-voltage thermoelectric generators is presented in this paper. The proposed system is based-on a two-stage boost scheme with self-startup ability. A maximum power point tracking technique based on the open-circuit voltage is adopted in the boost converter for high efficiency. Experimental results indicate that the proposed system can harvest thermoelectric energy and run a microcontroller unit and a wireless sensor node under low input voltage and power with high efficiency. The harvest system and wireless sensor node can be self-powered with minimum thermoelectric open-circuit voltage as 62 mV and input power of 84 mu W. With a self-startup scheme, the proposed system can self-start with a 20 mV input voltage. Low power designs are applied in the system to reduce the quiescent dissipation power. It results in better performance considering the conversion efficiency and self-startup ability compared to commercial boost systems used for thermal energy harvesting.(C) 2017 Elsevier Ltd. All rights reserved.
Authors
I am an author on this paper
Click your name to claim this paper and add it to your profile.
Reviews
Recommended
No Data Available