Smart Hybrid Multimodal Printed Harvesting of Energy

Project Information

SYMPHONY

Grant agreement ID: 862095

DOI

10.3030/862095

Project closed

EC signature date 23 March 2020

Start date 1 May 2020

End date 30 April 2024

Funded under

• INDUSTRIAL LEADERSHIP - Leadership in enabling and industrial technologies - Advanced materials

Total cost

€ 6 817 527,50

EU contribution

€ 6 817 527,50

Coordinated by

JOANNEUM RESEARCH FORSCHUNGSGESELLSCHAFT MBH
Austria

Periodic Reporting for period 3 - SYMPHONY (Smart Hybrid Multimodal Printed Harvesting of Energy)

Reporting period: 2023-05-01 to 2024-04-30

Summary of the context and overall objectives of the project

The 21st century has been dominated by an ambient digitalization and the increasing use of electronics in everyday objects. Current IoT scenarios expect around 75 billion connected devices by 2025, and the powering of these devices by batteries will result in a considerable amount of potentially hazardous waste. The spread of electronic systems in remote locations requires a change in power generation, making use of dislocated and disordered energy sources. A cost-efficient and environmentally friendly realization of energy harvesting (EH), however, is still a challenge, as the required input of functional material and electronic components in comparison to the energy output is high and often involves heavy metal based materials, manufacturing methods that consume high amounts of energy and costly assembly steps.

The SYMPHONY project is addressing all these challenges with the development of an innovative energy autonomous sensor system. The energy supply in this system is made of printed, recyclable, and non-toxic materials including the ferroelectric polymer P(VDF-TrFE), printable Si-based rectifiers, redox polymer batteries and cellulose-based supercapacitors. The SYMPHONY project develops cost effective and scalable methods to print these materials on flexible films and to combine them with energy efficient electronics and sensor technologies. The SYMPHONY project demonstrates the application of the self-powered sensors for room occupancy detection in smart floors, for condition monitoring on rotor-blades of wind turbines and for pressure monitoring in bicycle tubes.

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

In the SYMPHONY project new materials for energy harvesting, energy conversion and storage have been developed. We invented materials for triboelectric nanogenerators and the tailor made electropositive and electronegative materials were achieved a surface charge transfer of 237 μC/m2, which is close to the electrical breakdown of air in ambient conditions. We investigated different routes to produce P(VDF-TrFE) nanogenerators with a lower elastic modulus suitable for stretchable applications. We achieved a good stretchability based on a piezoelectric meander embedded in a stretchable rubber matrix. We noticed that the most efficient way to power sensor nodes is to match the maximum power point voltage output of the nanogenerators to the needed input voltage. This prevents the use of electronics for power conversion and thereby increases efficiency and reduces the cost of energy autonomous sensor systems. We thus investigated multilayer architectures and serial connection of piezoelectric elements in for magnetoelectric nanogenerators in order to tune the voltage and power output. We developed low-cost spray coated storage elements such as cellulose based supercaps, flexible rectifiers, and printed batteries as these flexible technologies integrate perfectly with the printed nanogenerators. All the target values were achieved for these devices, and we could integrate the components showing the successful charging of printed supercaps by printed nanogenerators using flexible rectifiers for current conversion. The supercaps even achieved a capacity of 11mF/cm2 with a low ESR, and serial connection of 4 elements supported capacity voltage up to 3V.

For each use case a dedicated energy autonomous sensor system was developed taking out the mechanical energy in the respective environment and transforming it to electrical energy. The energy is stored in a small capacitor accumulating a certain amount of energy sufficient to power a small microcontroller triggering a sensor measurement and wirelessly transmitting the data, via BLE, or RF protocols. The focus was set on the durable integration in the environment, which in turn means that the system has to survive the mechanical load from the actuation. This was a special challenge since all the use cases provided a harsh mechanical environment. A constantly deforming bicycle tube, a rotor blade of the wind turbine exposed to hail, sun, and ice, as well as a floor deformed beneath each footstep.

We showed that our devices are able to withstand these conditions and are able to generate enough energy for data transmission even after extended durability testing. It was our goal to produce low-cost and scalable devices by printing and coating technologies from solution. This requires the hybrid integration of electronic components on flexible substrates, which made good progresses. We aim to apply for an EIC transition project to further, develop the smart bicycle tube by overcoming current limitations regarding energy output especially at elevated tube pressures.

We promoted the project results through 7 OPEN ACEESS publications, sharing of lessons learnt during the participation to 14 international conferences, and communicating with broad public via project website (https://www.symphony-energy.eu/) press and social media (https://www.youtube.com/@energy-symphony; https://www.linkedin.com/company/energy-symphony/). We prepared for the exploitation of the project results through the organization of a specific SYMPHONY workshop, publications in 6 specialized magazines, participation to 22 industrial oriented events and definition of commercialization roadmaps for 8 results.

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 SYMPHONY energy autonomous sensor system demonstrated power generation and wireless data transmission in 3 applications: condition monitoring of rotor blades of a wind turbine, occupancy detection in rooms, and tire pressure monitoring in bicycles. The durability of the SYMPHONY demonstrators and their potential for extending the lifetime of the products, improving energy efficiency in buildings, and encouraging green mobility were assessed by the use case partners. The reduction of CO2 emissions, together with the improved safety for the cyclists and for the workers dealing with the SYMPHONY materials (i.e. nano safety aspects, lead free, non-toxicity) are addressed and provide a positive social impact.

The SYMPHONY printed technology can be integrated cost effectively in stretchable and flexible devices, representing a huge potential for usage in a wide range of further IoT-supported applications, as wearables, industrial machines, or rail tracks.

In a rigorous LCA analysis we have compared the SYMPHONY technologies to battery powered comparative systems or PZT nanogenerators, showing the reduced emission of CO2 and toxic waste in the production. As the P(VDF-TrFE) based harvesters already today show a 50% reduced price compared to commercially available PZT nanogenerators, the SYMPHONY system outperforms existing solutions in terms of economic and environmental aspects, with the potential for further price reduction in the future.

SYMPHONY will have impact not only in the field of applications for nanogenerators, but also at the material level since several material concepts developed in the project can also be applied for other purposes than energy harvesting.

The SMEs in the project have a strong interest to bring the developed energy autonomous sensor systems to market within the next 2-3 years.

SYMPHONY smart floor enrgy harvesting structure Source Joanneum Research

Scheme of the SYMPHONY Energy Autonomous Sensor System, applications and goal.

SYMPHONY demo awarded as best publicly funded project at the OE-A LOPEC 2024

SYMPHONY EAS mounted on wind turbine Source: eologix GmbH

SYMPHONY group photo at the final meeting in Lichtenegg wind park

Pressure monitoring in bicycle tires with SYMPHONY energy autonomous system Source Joanneum Research

SYMPHONY demo with piezoelectric harvester, rectifier and electrochromic display: Source RISE