Project description
Battery-less self-supplying technology for electricity generation
Even seemingly clean electronics contribute to the generation of trillions of batteries as waste. Interestingly, atmospheric pressure (P) and temperature (T) exhibit tidal-like variations. In the early 17th century, C. Drebbel invented the Eltham Perpetuum clock based on these P/T ‘tides’. However, both this invention and its successor, the Beverly clock, remained bulky and were limited to mechanical energy. The ERC-funded SFINKS project aims to develop battery-less, self-supplying technology by utilising natural P/T ‘tides’ to generate electricity. The project’s innovative micro-generators will harness the continuous and omnipresent nature of P/T ‘tides’ to produce energy regardless of location, installation, or orientation. This advancement is designed for use on Mars, Venus, and satellites, potentially eliminating the need for batteries in Internet of Things (IoT) devices.
Objective
Scientific and technological achievements are often accompanied with pollution of the planet. Even electronics, believed clean, produces waste counting in trillions of batteries. We propose a solution that consists in battery-less self-supplying and thus helping to keep our planet green.
Surprisingly, not only seas are exhibiting tides, the atmospheric pressure (P) and temperature (T) also do something similar. SFINKS will try to spark a new era of battery-less electronics via exploitation of the natural P/T tides to produce electricity in innovative micro-generators. The MAGIC of the P/T tides resides in that they are always-delivering and omnipresent. Such generators will thus produce energy continuously, everywhere, regardless their location, installation or orientation. This sounds like a dream, but
5 years after I got this idea my PhD students found a wonderful confirmation that the dream may become true. Early 17th century C.Drebbel constructed an Eltham Perpetuum clock based on the principle of P/T tides. One of its followers, the Beverly clock, is still running despite never having been wounded since 1864. However, for all these 400 years the invention has remained relatively bulky and stagnated at mechanical energy stage. In SFINKS we will firstly miniaturize it towards monolithic Silicon technology and develop innovative co-integrated conversion to electrical energy.
Our target will be the first always-delivering generator using an omnipresent energy source, the first free of any installation constraints, and also the first micro-scale generator using P/T tides to produce electricity! It will unblock further expansion of Internet of Things removing its bottle-neck i.e. batteries. Thanks to their quasi-perpetual lifetime, the SFINKS harvesters are also well suited to work on Mars, Venus or on board of satellites, where the P or T variations are very present. Our dream is to send a few SFINKS powered sensors with a space exploration mission on Mars.
Fields of science (EuroSciVoc)
CORDIS classifies projects with EuroSciVoc, a multilingual taxonomy of fields of science, through a semi-automatic process based on NLP techniques.
CORDIS classifies projects with EuroSciVoc, a multilingual taxonomy of fields of science, through a semi-automatic process based on NLP techniques.
- engineering and technologymechanical engineeringvehicle engineeringaerospace engineeringsatellite technology
- natural sciencesphysical sciencesastronomyplanetary sciencesplanets
- engineering and technologyelectrical engineering, electronic engineering, information engineeringelectronic engineeringsensors
- natural sciencesearth and related environmental sciencesenvironmental sciencespollution
- natural scienceschemical sciencesinorganic chemistrymetalloids
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Keywords
Programme(s)
- HORIZON.1.1 - European Research Council (ERC) Main Programme
Topic(s)
Funding Scheme
HORIZON-ERC - HORIZON ERC GrantsHost institution
00-661 Warszawa
Poland