Inductive power line harvester with flux guidance for self-powered sensors
File(s)
Author(s)
Wright, Steven W
Kiziroglou, Michail E
Yeatman, Eric M
Type
Journal Article
Abstract
Self-powered sensors are expected to enable new large-scale deployment and location access capabilities for sensor systems. Energy harvesting devices have been shown to provide adequate power densities but their dependence on very specific environmental conditions restricts their applicability. Energy harvesting from power line infrastructure offers an architecture for addressing this challenge, because such infrastructure is widely available. In this paper an inductive power line harvester concept is presented, based on a flux concentration approach adapted to a closed-loop core geometry. Flux concentration is studied by simulation, showing a 26% flux increase using a 1:3 geometrical concentration ratio in a closed-loop core. A 20×20×25 mm prototype with a U-shaped soft-core sheet and a 200-turn Cu coil around a 5 mm diameter, 20 mm long soft-core rod is introduced. The total device volume is 9.1 cm 3 . Characterization results on a power line evaluation setup for currents up to 35 A RMS and a 50 Hz – 1 kHz range are presented. Power between 2.2 mW (50 Hz) and 233 mW (1 kHz) is demonstrated on an ohmic load, from a 10 A RMS power line current, employing impedance matching with reactance cancellation. The corresponding power densities are 0.24 mW/cm 3 and 25 mW/cm 3 respectively, per total device volume. This performance is adequate for enabling self-powered wireless sensor networks installed along power distribution lines.
Date Issued
2023-09-15
Date Acceptance
2022-12-01
Citation
IEEE Sensors Journal, 2023, 23 (18), pp.20474-20482
ISSN
1530-437X
Publisher
Institute of Electrical and Electronics Engineers (IEEE)
Start Page
20474
End Page
20482
Journal / Book Title
IEEE Sensors Journal
Volume
23
Issue
18
Copyright Statement
Copyright © 2022 IEEE. Personal use of this material is permitted. Permission from IEEE must be obtained for all other uses, in any current or future media, including reprinting/republishing this material for advertising or promotional purposes, creating new collective works, for resale or redistribution to servers or lists, or reuse of any copyrighted component of this work in other works. For the
purpose of open access, the authors have applied a Creative Commons
Attribution (CC BY) license to any Accepted Manuscript version arising.
purpose of open access, the authors have applied a Creative Commons
Attribution (CC BY) license to any Accepted Manuscript version arising.
Identifier
https://ieeexplore.ieee.org/document/9969613
Publication Status
Published
Date Publish Online
2022-12-02