Energy Harvesting for Sustainable Structures

ENERGYHARVESTINGFORTHESUSTAINABILITYOFSTRUCTURESANDINFRASTRUCTURES
ENERGY HARVESTING FOR THE
SUSTAINABILITY OF STRUCTURES AND
INFRASTRUCTURES
SEMC 2013: The fifth International Conference on
Structural Engineering, Mechanics and Computation
Cape Town, South Africa, 2-4 September 2013
Chiara Crosti
Konstantinos Gkoumas, Francesco Petrini,
Stefania Arangio, Chiara Crosti
Sapienza University of Rome
konstantinos.gkoumas; francesco.petrini; stefania.arangio; chiara.crosti
{@uniroma1.it}

Research motivation
• Sustainability nowadays is a key issue for
structures and infrastructures
• Over the last few years, many promising
applications of Energy Harvesting (EH) have
appeared, not only in academy but also in the
design practice
Chiara Crosti 1
design practice
• In the civil engineering field, the energy obtained by
EH devices can be used in different applications
(e.g. alimentation of monitoring sensors) focusing
at the energy sustainability
• Vibration energy harvesting from wind flow using
piezoelectric materials is very promising

Presentation outline
• Energy Harvesting (EH) context in the civil
engineering field
– Sustainability issues for buildings
– EH overview
– Framework for the optimal coupling of EH devices
with the structure
Chiara Crosti 2
with the structure
– Piezoelectric Energy Harvesting
• Preliminary conceptual and numerical applications
on buildings, focusing on the modelling of
piezoelectric devices
• Considerations and indications for further research

Sustainability for buildings
Passive and active sustainability measures
• Sustainability in the urban and built environment is a key
issue for the wellbeing of people and society.
• Sustainability issues are wide-ranging in the building
industry but the main focus is the reduction of energy
consumption in construction and use.
Chiara Crosti 3
Energy
sustainability
Passive systems
Active systems
Materials
Design
Energy Harvesting/
Renewables
...

Sustainability for buildings
Passive and active sustainability measures
• Passive: focus is primarily on the use of more energy
efficient materials and on the optimized design of structural
and non-structural elements.
• Active: focus is on the “on-site” energy production,
something that leads to a lower energy need from the grid.
Chiara Crosti 4
Energy
sustainability
Passive systems
Active systems
Materials
Design
Energy Harvesting/
Renewables
...

Energy Harvesting (EH) can be defined as the
sum of all those processes that allow to capture
the freely available energy in the environment
and convert it in (electric) energy that can be
Energy harvesting
Overview
Chiara Crosti
and convert it in (electric) energy that can be
used or stored.
Harvesting Conversion
Use
Storage
5

Energy harvesting
Resources and energy extraction systems
Resources
Sun
Water
Wind
Extraction systems
Magnetic Induction
Electrostatic
Piezoelectric
Chiara Crosti
Wind
Temperature differential
Mechanical vibrations
Acoustic waves
Magnetic fields
Radio waves
Piezoelectric
Photovoltaic
Thermal Energy
Radiofrequency
Radiant Energy
6

Energy harvesting taxonomy
EH applications in structures and infrastructures
can be divided in three groups:
• EH on a micro-scale, the main objective is to
replace batteries or eliminate cabling for electrical
power (SHM sensors, etc.)
• Eh on a meso-scale, the main objective is to
produce a great amount of energy otherwise
Chiara Crosti 7
supplied from the electrical grid (sustainable
structures or infrastructures)
• EH on a macro-scale, the objective is to supply
energy to the electrical grid (wind turbines,
photovoltaics, etc.)

Motivation
Micro-scale energy harvesting
• Ever-growing energy gap between energy source (batteries) and
microelectronic systems.
• Even though a great process took place in the last decade, there are still
issues to be solved and improved, such as: power storage efficiency,
communication standards, integration of devices, cost of the ownership .
Chiara Crosti
Source: Smart Fibers
Elimination of power cables
Development over the past decade
in the field of structural health monitoring
(SHM), mainly for long span bridges.
Possibility to eliminate power cables and
transmit data wirelessly.
8
The produced energy is in the range of µW/mWs

• EH on a meso-scale, the main objective is to
Chiara Crosti 9
supplied from the electrical grid (sustainable
structures or infrastructures)

Freeway wind turbines
• Energy production for the sustainability of structures or infrastructures
Motivation
Meso-scale energy harvesting
Chiara Crosti
Sustainable infrastructures (source: www.treehugger.com )
Sustainable
structures
Wind
skyscraper
10
The produced energy is in the range of W/mWs

• EH on meso-scale, the main objective is to produce
a great amount of energy otherwise supplied from
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the electrical grid (sustainable structures or
infrastructures)

• Large scale energy production
• Many solutions for powering the grid (wind farms, photovoltaics etc.)
Motivation
Macro-scale energy harvesting
Chiara Crosti
Offshore wind farms
Wind farms
Photovoltaic systems
12
The produced energy is in the range of MW/mWs

• EH on meso-scale, the main objective is to produce
Chiara Crosti 13
the electrical grid (sustainable structures or
infrastructures)

Classification of the EH schemes
Chiara Crosti 14
EH = Maximum extractable energy
EC
SS = Energy cost of the structural system
EC
ES = Energy cost of the extraction system
EC = Total energy cost of the coupled system = EC
SS + EC
ES
ÊH = Effective extracted energy of the coupled system
∆E = Energy balance of the coupled system = ÊH - EC

Classification of the EH schemes
Chiara Crosti 15
SYSTEMEFFICIENCY
∆E = Energy balance of the coupled system = ÊH – EC
∆E’ = Energy balance of the extraction system = ÊH - EC
ES

engineering field
– Sustainability issues for buildings
– EH overview
with the structure
Chiara Crosti 16
with the structure
– Piezoelectric Energy Harvesting
• Preliminary conceptual and numerical applications
on buildings, focusing on the modelling of
piezoelectric devices

Piezoelectric energy harvesting
Piezoelectric convertors
Piezoelectricity is the charge that accumulates in certain solid materials
(crystals, certain ceramics, etc.) in response to applied mechanical stress
(direct effect) or the internal generation of a mechanical strain resulting from
an applied electrical field (inverse effect).
• In the first case, the piezoelectric element is deformed when subjected to vibrations.
• Different configurations are possible.
• The most simple are based on a cantilever beam configuration.
Chiara Crosti 17
The unpolarized material (a) is
polarized when subjected to
external stress (b). As a
consequence, electricity is
produced v (t).
Source: Mitcheson 2005 Source: Huang et al. 2007
Measurement
SpecialtiesTM
MiniSense 100 Piezo
Sensor

Piezoelectric energy harvesting
Piezoelectric convertors (2)
Supplier: Smart Material Supplier: Face International Supplier: APC International
Macro Fiber Composite (MFC) Thunder (Thin Layer Unimorph
Ferroelectric Driver and Sensor)
Bimorphs
Chiara Crosti 18
Supplier: Smart Material
Characteristics: flexible, d33 and
d13 modes, low strain high
frequency, 460pC/N in d33
Supplier: Face International
Characteristics: small displacements
(~2mm), good for low frequency (~1 Hz)
Supplier: APC International
Characteristics: frequency range
5-100 Hz, large deflections
Max. blocking Force 28N to 1kN 67 N 350N to 600N
Max. operating Voltage -500 to +1500V -240 to +480 V -150 to +150 V
Max. operating frequency <3MHz NA NA
Typical Lifetime 1010 Cycles NA NA
Typical Thickness 0.30 mm 0.43 mm 0.10 mm
Typical Capacitance 2nF to 200 nF NA NA
Source: Remick, K. UIUCD.
Inman, D.J. and Priya, S. “Energy Harvesting Technologies”. Springer Science+Business Media. Chapter 1, 2009.

Applications for the energy sustainability
EH in buildings – a premise
Chiara Crosti 19
• EH devices are used for powering remote monitoring sensors (e.g.
temperature sensors, air quality sensors), also those placed inside
heating, ventilation, and air conditioning (HVAC) ducts.
• These sensors are very important for the minimization of energy
consumption in large buildings
Image courtesy of
enocean-alliance®
http://www.enocean-alliance.org

EH in buildings – a premise
Chiara Crosti 20
Currently:
• Power is provided by batteries or EH devices based on thermal or RF methods
• Sensors work intermittently (to consume less power ~ 100mW)
An EH sensor based on piezoelectric material has several advantages being capable to
provide up to 10-15 times more power than currently used devices leading to additional
applications or longer operation time.
Image courtesy of
enocean-alliance®
http://www.enocean-alliance.org

l
Description of the piezoelectric EH device
• A plate in piezoelectric material
(piezoelectric fin) is placed
perpendicularly in the wind flow
direction in order to take
advantage of the Vortex
Chiara Crosti 21
b
d
Air flow
advantage of the Vortex
Shedding effect.
• For the preliminary design the
entire fin is in piezoelectric
material
• Parametric design is performed
on the fin dimensions

Conceptual application (1)
Natural flow in vertical ducts of high-rise buildings
Stack effect due to temperature: temperature differential + external wind
Chiara Crosti 22
Piezoelectric fin
Indicative values of the flow velocity: ~ 0.1-0.2 m/s

Air flow
Conceptual application (2)
Mechanical flow in HVAC
Mechanically induced flow inside the duct
Chiara Crosti 23
Air flow
Indicative values of the flow velocity: ~ 0.5 m/s
Image: http://www.yukoshvac.com/

l
Preliminary results
Chiara Crosti 24
b
d
Air flow
Results obtained by scaling numerical results from:
L A Weinstein, M R Cacan, P M So and P K Wright, Vortex shedding induced energy harvesting from
piezoelectric materials in heating, ventilation and air conditioning flows Smart Mater. Struct. 21 (2012) 045003

engineering field
– Overview
– EH taxonomy
with the structure
Chiara Crosti 25
with the structure
– Research fields
• Preliminary numerical applications on civil
structures and infrastructures, focusing on the
modelling of piezoelectric devices

• This study focuses on an overview of the EH potential in
civil engineering structures
• A framework for the energy extraction is also provided
• Specific applications for EH applications for the
energy sustainability of buildings are introduced,
together with preliminary results
Considerations and indications for further
research
Chiara Crosti
together with preliminary results
• Additional considerations are needed for practical
applications.
• the optimum (and cost effective) use of piezoelectric
materials
• the energy transform and storage options
• the production feasibility at an industrial level
26

“ENERGY HARVESTING FOR THE
SUSTAINABILITY OF STRUCTURES AND
INFRASTRUCTURES”
Chiara Crosti
Thank you for your attention
INFRASTRUCTURES”
Konstantinos Gkoumas, Francesco Petrini, Stefania Arangio, Chiara Crosti
Sapienza University of Rome, Department of Structural and Geotechnical Engineering
e-mail: chiara.crosti@{uniroma1.it; stronger2012.com}

Energy Harvesting for Sustainable Structures

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