Acoustic Energy Harvesting Using Quarter-Wavelength Straight-Tube Resonator

Although there have been significant efforts in harvesting environmental energy, our environment is still full of wasted and unused energy. As clean, ubiquitous and sustainable energy source, acoustic energy is one of the wasted energies and is abundant in our life. Therefore, it is of great interest to investigate acoustic energy harvesting mechanism as an alternative to existing energy harvesters. In this study, in order to harvest acoustic energy, piezoelectric cantilever beams are placed inside a quarter-wavelength straight-tube resonator. When the straight-tube resonator is excited by an incident wave at its acoustic eigenfrequency, an amplified acoustic resonant wave is developed inside the tube and drives the vibration motion of the piezoelectric beams. The piezoelectric beams have been designed to have the same structural eigenfrequency as the acoustic eigenfrequency of the tube resonators to maximize the amount of the harvested energy. With a single beam placed inside the tube resonators, the harvested voltage and power become the maximum near the tube open inlet where the acoustic pressure gradient is at the maximum. As the beam is moved to the tube closed end, the voltage and power gradually decrease due to the decreased acoustic pressure gradient. Multiple piezoelectric beams have been placed along the centerline of the tube resonators in order to increase the amount of harvested energy. Due to the interruption of acoustic air particle motion caused by the beams, it is found that placing piezoelectric beams near the closed tube end is not beneficial. The output voltage of the piezoelectric beams increases linearly as the incident sound pressure increases.