RePower: Maintenance-free and cost-efficient fuel for wireless sensors to energy- and resource-saving solutions

Project Information

RePower

Grant agreement ID: 732582

DOI

10.3030/732582

Project closed

EC signature date 17 September 2016

Start date 1 July 2016

End date 30 November 2018

Funded under

• SOCIETAL CHALLENGES - Secure, clean and efficient energy

Total cost

€ 1 578 931,25

EU contribution

€ 1 105 251,00

Coordinated by

REMONI A/S
Denmark

Periodic Reporting for period 5 - RePower (RePower: Maintenance-free and cost-efficient fuel for wireless sensors to energy- and resource-saving solutions)

Reporting period: 2018-07-01 to 2018-11-30

Summary of the context and overall objectives of the project

Problem: Waste and overconsumption of resources are major challenges in modern societies, as it leads to unnecessary environmental burdens and economic loss. To lower the loss, monitoring building health and energy consumption are of great importance to ensure that the technical installations and the building itself perform. Modern monitoring sensors measuring the building health and energy consumption (e.g. temperature, moisture sensors) are operated wireless on batteries, to allow easy and cost-efficient installation. In the execution phase, it however becomes overly expensive replacing the batteries, due to the location of the monitoring sensors. These are often located inside building constructions (inside the insulation, behind walls, floors, ceiling, in concrete, etc.) making access difficult and demanding. To avoid batteries energy harvester technologies may be used to obtain energy from the surroundings. The existing energy harvesting technologies do, however, not work inside the building constructions hereby calling on new technology to address this challenge

Solution: The patented RePower solution is created to solve this industry-wide challenge not properly addressed by any of the competing technologies. RePower deliver battery-less and maintenance-free sensors to wireless monitor e.g. buildings, powerlines or machines, by harvesting the energy from the outside of multicore power cables, without damaging the cable in any way. The RePower’ed sensors can be either encapsulated directly with RePower, used as a separate component, or powering a sensor placed away from the power cable.
Multicore cables are widely present in building constructions, and RePower can therefore be retrofit (by layman) to existing cables throughout the building. RePower thereby disrupts the market for wireless sensor systems, by enabling battery-less sensors in an environment where batteries have been the only option, until today. Compared to other sensor energy sources, RePower is: (A) Designed and optimized for building installations; (B) Cost-efficient; (C) Non-invasive; (D) Long-life; (E) Safe; (F) Made for slim designs.

Work performed from the beginning of the project to the end of the period covered by the report and main results achieved so far

The project is ahead of schedule.

The sensor platform is running in Beta in the first real life installations. Especially the low power consumption has been a priority to ensure a good match between the sensor platform part, and the energy harvester part.

The encapsulation prototype tool is made, and well-functioning, along with the assembly tools, as planned.

On the business side, the first feasibility tests are running in Denmark, Finland and Portugal. An updated market analysis is conducted. On the staff side, the new persons on the market side are started well, and we expect to employee yet another one.

Dissemination is performed through the following means:
• Dissemination through the press.
• Dissemination through workshops and conferences.
• Meetings with a number of network partners, and potential future partners.

See also:
o remoni.com

Open data: There are established an open API (Application Programming Interface) to allow open access for scientists to data from the project. An initial version of cloud based interface is running at api.remoni.com with username “demo” and password “demo”.

IPR protection: RePower is patented. The patent is sought in a number of countries worldwide (EU, US, Australia, China, Japan, etc.). We have received positive feedback on it, and it is already granted in the first countries, while the process proceeds in the other.

Progress beyond the state of the art and expected potential impact (including the socio-economic impact and the wider societal implications of the project so far)

The novelty of RePower is a cost-efficient and flexible energy source for IoT sensors in places where no other energy harvester solutions are available today. RePower is simply clamped non-invasively on the outside of the existing cables in the environment, which needs to be monitored. The key market applications are therefore to power wireless sensors to monitor inside building constructions and on power lines, where an easy-to-install and inexpensive energy harvester solution is needed.
RePower is a highly attractive technology enabling a whole new field of cost-efficient IoT benefits; e.g. building monitoring and power line monitoring. RePower will therefore help the growing IoT sector, improving its sustainability and promoting job creation. At the same time, RePower has the opportunity to strength the European position with a novel solution for solving the power issue of wireless sensors, and strengthening European competitiveness in the IoT market.
IoT is expected to bring unprecedented opportunities to business and society on a global level. Minimizing production failure and waste of energy – and thus increasing productivity – is one of the key attractions of the RePower based IoT sensors. Thereby RePower help addressing the EU strategies on climate change, circular economy, income and job generation.
Many countries lack enabling conditions required to spur the application of these new technologies across their economies. Particularly, Europe has failed to exploit the full potential of the first wave of the internet revolution and is still missing out on some cutting-edge technologies, when compared, e.g. to the US.
By avoiding the use of batteries in the IoT sensors, RePower will also enable a positive environmental impact and lower the risk of fires due to short circuit lithium batteries, and thereby help avoiding further negative environmental and economic impact.

Waste and overconsumption of resources are major challenges in many EU countries, as it leads to unnecessary environmental burdens and economic loss. A significant part of the wasted resources origins from dysfunctional or inefficient technical installations and damaged buildings; the energy consumption itself accounts for 40 % of the total energy consumed in the EU. These losses can be avoided by installing sensor systems to monitor the building health; i.e. for commissioning, power consumption, moisture, intruding water, powerlines and dysfunctional devices. There is a significant potential in both the public and private sectors: for example, moisture in building constructions costs billions of Euro each year, and continuous detailed surveillance of the building insulation and energy consumption yields savings of 10 to 70 %.
In the later third stage, RePower is optimised, which will enhance the market and employment further.

RePowered sensor on cable