Energy Harvesting from Breeze Wind (0.7–6 m s⁻¹) Using Ultra‐Stretchable Triboelectric Nanogenerator

Abstract

Wind is one of the most important sources of green energy, but the current technology for harvesting wind energy is only effective when the wind speed is beyond 3.5–4.0 m s−1. This is mainly due to the limitation that the electromagnetic generator works best at high frequency. This means that light breezes cannot reach the wind velocity threshold of current wind turbines. Here, a high‐performance triboelectric nanogenerator (TENG) for efficiently harvesting energy from an ambient gentle wind, especially for speeds below 3 m s−1 is reported, by taking advantage of the relative high efficiency of TENGs at low‐frequency. Attributed to the multiplied‐frequency vibration of ultra‐stretchable and perforated electrodes, an average output of 20 mW m−3 can be achieved with inlet wind speed of 0.7 m s−1, while an average energy conversion efficiency of 7.8% at wind speed of 2.5 m s−1 is reached. A self‐charging power package is developed and the applicability of the TENG in various light breezes is demonstrated. This work demonstrates the advantages of TENG technology for breeze energy exploitation and proposes an effective supplementary approach for current employed wind turbines and micro energy structure.

A universal managing circuit with stabilized voltage for maintaining safe operation of self-powered electronics system

“…An environmental sensor system based on flexible LS-TENGs is exhibited in Figure 5 B, which is consisted of three parts: TENGs, universal managing circuit, and BLE sensor beacon. The TENG is a typical leaf-shaped device with six strips made by a PTFE film, Cu foil, and polyethylene terephthalate (PET) film, while the detailed design concept can be found in the previous studies ( Ren et al., 2020a , 2020b ; Zheng et al., 2018 ; Wang et al., 2020a , 2020b , 2020c ; Xu et al., 2020 ). The contact-separation motions of six strips orderly can harvest environmental wind energy ( Ren et al., 2019 ; Zhang et al., 2016 ).…”

“…Harvesting energy from ambient environment or human motion is one of most promising strategies to compensate the deficiencies of battery ( Li et al., 2020a , 2020b ; Zhang et al., 2018 ; Liu et al., 2020a , 2020b ; García Núñez et al., 2019 ; Xue et al., 2017 ; Seol et al., 2015 ; Kim et al., 2018 ). First proposed by Wang Group in 2012 ( Fan et al., 2012 ), the triboelectric nanogenerator (TENG, also called Wang generator), which can convert all kinds of mechanical energy into electricity, has so far been applied in many fields, including the exploitation of ocean wave energy ( Liang et al., 2020a , 2020b , 2020c ), harvesting human motions energy ( Zhao and You, 2014 ; Ren et al., 2020a , 2020b ; Miao et al., 2019 ), and even heartbeat energy ( Ouyang et al., 2019 ; Liu et al., 2019a , 2019b ). Driven by the Maxwell's displacement current, TENGs have significant high-voltage output, which can reach thousands of volts, while the current output of TENGs is very low within the microampere level, and the internal resistance is very large within the megohm level ( Wang et al., 2020a , 2020b , 2020c ; Liu et al., 2019a , 2019b ; Xia et al., 2019 ; Zi et al., 2016a , 2016b ; Li et al., 2020a , 2020b ; Mao et al., 2017 ).…”

Textile-Based Triboelectric Nanogenerators for Wearable Self-Powered Microsystems

“…Triboelectric nanogenerator (TENG) has become a research hotspot after it was proposed by Wang [ 12 ] in 2012 because of its merits of wide material selection, simple production, and flexible and wearable characteristics [ 13 , 14 ]. Based on the coupling effect of triboelectrification and electrostatic induction, the TENG harvests ubiquitous mechanical energy in the natural environment, such as wind energy [ 15 , 16 , 17 ], water energy [ 18 , 19 , 20 ], and human body movements [ 21 , 22 , 23 ]. Based on the advantages of the above-mentioned TENG, scientists have discovered that textile-based TENG (T-TENG), which combines traditional textile technology with it, is a significant and promising field of the future development of wearable electronic products, due to the advantages of air permeability, flexibility, and flexible structure.…”

A Skin‐Inspired Triboelectric Nanogenerator with an Interpenetrating Structure for Motion Sensing and Energy Harvesting

“…[1][2][3] The TENG has been recognized as a promising renewable energy generation method. [4,5] Various TENGs have been designed to harvest a variety of mechanical energies from surrounding environments, such as wind, [6,7] water waves, [8,9] mechanical vibrations, [10][11][12] human motions, [13][14][15][16][17] etc. It utilizes the triboelectrification and electrostatic induction between two materials with different electron affinities to generate the electron transfer and further electricity.…”