Enhancement of the Piezoelectric Cantilever Beam Performance via Vortex-Induced Vibration to Harvest Ocean Wave Energy

Abstract

Renewable and sustainable energies exhibit promising performance while serving as the power supply of a wireless sensor especially located in marine waters. Various microgenerators have been developed to harvest wave energy. However, the conversion ability from a dynamic oscillating source of wave is crucial to enhance their effectiveness in practical applications. In this paper, a new piezoelectric converter system is proposed to harvest the kinetic energy from ocean waves. The vortex-induced effect in an air channel enhances the vibration performance, improving the energy harvesting efficiency. The system comprises an oscillating water column (OWC) air chamber, a bluff body, and a piezoelectric piece for electromechanical transduction. The fluid–solid–electric coupling finite element method was used to investigate the relation between the output voltage and geometrical parameters, including the size and position of the piezoelectric cantilever beam, which is based on the user-defined function of the ANSYS. It is found that the bluff body in the outlet channel above the air chamber induced high-frequency vortex shedding vibration. The regular wave rushed into the air chamber with a frequency of 0.285 Hz and extruded the air across the bluff body in the outlet channel. This incurred the fluctuation of the air pressure and excited the piezoelectric cantilever beam vibration with a high frequency of 233 Hz in the wake region. Furthermore, a continuous electrical output with a peak voltage of 6.11 V is generated, which has potential applications for the wireless sensors on the marine buoy.

Piezoelectric vibration energy harvesting with asymmetric hybrid bracing beam

“…22 By arranging the experiments by the orthogonal experiment method according to the orthogonal table L(4 3 ), only 4 × 4 =16 experiments are required, thus greatly reducing the workload. According to the experimental research of Yuan Jiangbo 23 and Du Xiaozhen, 24 considering the small mass and small size requirements of the piezoelectric energy harvesting structure, the orthogonal table shown in Table 2 is designed.…”

Vortex-Induced Vibration Suppression of Bridges by Inerter-Based Dynamic Vibration Absorbers

“…Sustained vibration can cause fatigue of the bridge structure, affecting the safety of vehicles and the comfort of pedestrians. erefore, the research on vortex-induced vibration has become a very active topic for scholars [2][3][4][5][6][7].…”

Flapping and powering characteristics of a flexible piezoelectric nanogenerator at Reynolds number range simulating ocean current

“…Bae et al demonstrated that the regimes of fluttering behavior, including contact and chaotic modes, were defined in a regime map for different flag lengths and flow velocities 15 . With the Re value at approximately 35,058, Du et al demonstrated that the output power can be enhanced when an energy harvester is driven at its resonant frequency by vortex shedding 16 . Piezoelectric energy harvesting design studies were presented by installing a novel spindle-like and butterfly-like bluff body with the galloping phenomena 17 or by employing vibration levels that vary according to the difference in the spacing of multiple bluff bodies [18][19][20] to increase the output.…”