Piezoelectric-Based Energy Harvesting for Smart City Application

With the popularization of Internet-of-things (IoT) and wireless communication systems, a diverse set of applications in smart cities are emerging to improve the city-life. These applications usually require a large coverage area and minimal operation and maintenance cost. To this end, the recently emerging backscatter communication (BC) is gaining interest in both industry and academia as a new communication paradigm that provides high energy efficient communications that may even work in a battery-less mode and, thus, it is well suited for smart city applications. However, the coverage of BC in urban area deployments is not available, and the feasibility of its utilization for smart city applications is not known. In this article, we present a comprehensive coverage study of a practical cellular carrier-based BC system for indoor and outdoor scenarios in a downtown area of a Helsinki city. In particular, we evaluate the coverage outage performance of different low-power and wide area technologies, i.e., long range (LoRa) backscatter, arrow band-Internet of Things (NB-IoT), and Bluetooth low energy (BLE) based BC at different frequencies of operation. To do so, we carry out a comprehensive campaign of simulations while using a sophisticated three-dimensional (3D) ray tracing (RT) tool, ITU outdoor model, and 3rd generation partnership project (3GPP) indoor hotspot model. This study also covers the energy harvesting aspects of backscatter device, and it highlights the importance of future backscatter devices with high energy harvesting efficiency. The simulation results and discussion provided in this article will be helpful in understanding the coverage aspects of practical backscatter communication system in a smart city environment.

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Development of Micro-Mobility Based on Piezoelectric Energy Harvesting for Smart City Applications

Sustainability ◽

10.3390/su12072933 ◽

2020 ◽

Vol 12 (7) ◽

pp. 2933 ◽

Cited By ~ 2

Author(s):

Chaiyan Jettanasen ◽

Panapong Songsukthawan ◽

Atthapol Ngaopitakkul

Keyword(s):

Energy Source ◽

Energy Harvesting ◽

Smart City ◽

Alternative Energy ◽

Mechanical Energy ◽

Electrical Energy ◽

Piezoelectric Energy Harvesting ◽

Alternative Energy Source ◽

Piezoelectric Energy ◽

Energy Harvesting System

This study investigates the use of an alternative energy source in the production of electric energy to meet the increasing energy requirements, encourage the use of clean energy, and thus reduce the effects of global warming. The alternative energy source used is a mechanical energy by piezoelectric material, which can convert mechanical energy into electrical energy, that can convert mechanical energy from pressure forces and vibrations during activities such as walking and traveling into electrical energy. Herein, a pilot device is designed, involving the modification of a bicycle into a stationary exercise bike with a piezoelectric generator, to study energy conversion and storage generated from using the bike. Secondly, the piezoelectric energy harvesting system is used on bicycles as a micro-mobility, light electric utility vehicle with smart operation, providing a novel approach to smart city design. The results show that the energy harvested from the piezoelectric devices can be stored in a 3200 mAh, 5 V battery and power sensors on the bicycle. Moreover, 13.6 mW power can be generated at regular cycling speed, outputting 11.5 V and 1.2 mA. Therefore, the piezoelectric energy harvesting system has sufficient potential for application as a renewable energy source that can be used with low power equipment.

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Implementing an energy harvesting technology within the concept of Smart city

MATEC Web of Conferences ◽

10.1051/matecconf/201819301030 ◽

2018 ◽

Vol 193 ◽

pp. 01030 ◽

Cited By ~ 1

Author(s):

Sofia Kalyazina ◽

Aleksandr Lepekhin

Keyword(s):

Energy Harvesting ◽

Smart City ◽

Urban Infrastructure ◽

Research Paper ◽

Potential Solution ◽

Research Activities ◽

Global Goal ◽

Big Cities

Smart city is a global goal of big cities, it is an emerging concept, which requires different research activities in many different directions to create an urban infrastructure and, what is even more important, transform minds. The topic of energetics is one of the baseline directions for creating Smart city infrastructure. The concept of energy harvesting becomes in this term quite important and deserves specific attention. This research paper is aiming to highlight an energy harvesting problem in the context of smart city and to make an attempt to propose a potential solution, a technology to be implemented to tackle that problem.

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