Progress in Piezoelectric Material Based Oceanic Wave Energy Conversion Technology

Abstract

Recently, electrical engineers are paying great attention to develop oceanic wave energy conversion technologies based on the piezoelectric materials because of their excellent conveniences. Piezoelectric oceanic wave energy converters (OWECs) have several benefits over the others such as its small size, lightweight, no requirement of using intermediate device as well as having less negative impacts on the oceanic environment. Various review and research papers focus on the piezoelectric devices, their operation and application for oceanic energy conversion. But, to the best of the authors' knowledge, none of the existing research or review papers present detailed scheme of piezoelectric device based power generation covering all the relevant topics as depicted in this review. This paper focuses different aspects of piezoelectric device based oceanic wave energy conversion technology including prospect, historical development, classification, operating principle, configuration, arrangement, model, processing, post-processing, and their test setups. In addition, technical challenges, future direction of research and critical review are also illustrated. It is assumed that, this paper would play a significant role for the future development of piezoelectric OWECs and the researcher working in this field. INDEX TERMS Energy conversion, oceanic wave energy, piezoelectric material, piezoelectric generator, renewable energy, wave power.

An Atlas of Piezoelectric Energy Harvesters in Oceanic Applications

“…Kim has reviewed electroactive polymers for ocean kinetic energy harvesting [27]. Kiran et al presented a review of different aspects of piezoelectricity and provided a historical state-of-the-art in the piezoelectric energy harvesters in the ocean [28]. There are, however, other reviews in the field [2,3,29] but none of them compiled a comprehensive atlas of piezoelectric energy harvesters' design.…”

Niche Applications and Flexible Devices for Wave Energy Conversion: A Review

“…Piezoelectric WECs (PWECs) offer the advantage of embedding the power take-off mechanism directly into the prime mover (usually a flexible piezoelectric membrane), thus reducing the amount of mechanical connections present in the device. Technical schemes of several proposed PWEC technologies are available in the detailed reviews of Jbaily and Yeung [63] and Kiran et al [64]. The power generated by a typical piezoelectric WEC is in the order of kW, which is enough to supply small appliances, sensors and offshore buoys.…”

A Piezoelectric Wave Energy Harvester Using Plucking-Driven and Frequency Up-Conversion Mechanism

“…Integrating the partial differential equation of motion [Equation (17)] in the governing equation of motion [Equation (12)] to obtain the ordinary differential equation of electromechanically coupled for the modal response:…”

“…Malleable piezoelectric materials have been used to develop energyharvesting devices from micro and nanoscale to generate electrical power for various applications [8][9][10][11]. Recently, piezoelectric materials have been used to apply WEC technology to convert wave energy into electrical energy [12]. Although there are still many challenges to overcome, such as highly variable frequency of wave motion, harsh ocean environment, and extremely variable climatic conditions, there are still many advantages such as low cost, low maintenance, and versatility that drives many researchers to invest in applying piezoelectric material on WEC technology.…”