Análise numérica e experimental de geradores piezelétricos de energia

Abstract

The use of piezoelectric devices to harvest vibration energy has found applications in several areas, especially in structural health monitoring, either to recharge batteries or to directly feed sensors and also electronic devices. In general, the practical use of the energy converted by these devices requires, first, converting the alternating current (AC) produced to direct current (DC). This is normally done by using rectifier circuits. However, modeling the harvesting system, usually a PZT sensor bonded on a cantilever micro-beam and coupled to a rectifier circuit, using the same software package is pointed out by some authors as a drawback to overcome, due to its multidisciplinary requirements, involving topics of both mechanical and electrical engineering. In this sense, the main goal of this dissertation is to describe a comprehensive and simple modeling strategy, which considers a single computational platform and, simultaneously, account for both the electromechanical model of a clamped piezoelectric beam and the practical energy harvesting circuit, seeking ways to facilitate the analysis and design of energy harvesting systems. Numerical simulations and experimental tests are performed to illustrate the proposed approach, considering a full-wave diode bridge as the non-controlled rectifier circuit and a resistive load, which are directly connected to the cantilevered piezoelectric beam. Additionally, experimental tests carried out with a commercial harvesting system are presented, aiming to characterize and compare its performance with a full-wave diode bridge and a resistive circuit, both developed by the author. A single degree of freedom model of this system is also presented. The results showed that the model is suitable to perform simulations of systemshaving the characteristics described in this dissertation and confirmed the need of using active circuits to better use the produced energy.