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Metamaterial Enabled Vibration Energy Harvesting

Project description

Novel energy harvester to eliminate batteries

Wireless technologies have evolved rapidly in recent years, and energy harvesting techniques are an important element of these new advances. However, more power is needed to service today’s demand for fully autonomous wireless sensors. The EU-funded MetaVEH project is developing innovative lead-free electromechanical energy harvesters that will be easy to install and simple to use. The mechanical core of the new harvesters will integrate lead-free piezoelectric patches enhanced by the unique wave control capacities of resonant elastic metamaterials. The goal is to eventually eliminate the use of batteries, which are expensive and come with a toxic chemical cost. With the use of the project’s vibration energy harvesters (VEH) as a primary power source, batteries will no longer be necessary and sensors will become fully autonomous.

Objective

Increasing demand for fully autonomous wireless sensors to service the emerging technologies of the internet of things, remote and real time monitoring of vulnerable environments or self-sensing smart structures is driving a requirement for efficient and novel methods of energy harvesting. The sensor's data communication has a substantial power requirement that presents a serious constraint upon the number of sensors, and their capability. Our primary aim is to realise innovative Lead-free electromechanical energy harvesters; these will be easily installed, to power, in a clean and low-cost manner, autonomous wireless sensing devices thereby eliminating batteries and human intervention: This will revolutionise sensor applications whilst simultaneously reducing chemical waste. This is timely as in current solutions battery replacement is either logistically impossible or too expensive and batteries carry a toxic chemical cost. Solar panels have the environmental drawback of using toxic materials. In our vision of future sensor technology, with our vibration energy harvesters (VEH) as their primary power source, a battery, will become unnecessary, and their associated chemical waste will no longer occur, and these sensors will become truly autonomous. The harvester's mechanical core will draw on advanced multiresonator designs, integrating Lead-free piezoelectric patches enhanced by the unique wave control capacities of resonant elastic metamaterials. Currently microVEH, though promising, suffers due to frequency mismatch: We have the ambition to bridge the gap between different scales by leveraging the potential of metamaterials. This will dramatically increase the energy available for harvesting, and operational bandwidth. For electronic applications the integration of rectifiers in the circuitry will allow for the full exploitation of the multiresonant design.

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Topic(s)

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RIA - Research and Innovation action

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Call for proposal

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(opens in new window) H2020-FETPROACT-2019-2020

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Coordinator

ZURCHER HOCHSCHULE FUR ANGEWANDTE WISSENSCHAFTEN
Net EU contribution

Net EU financial contribution. The sum of money that the participant receives, deducted by the EU contribution to its linked third party. It considers the distribution of the EU financial contribution between direct beneficiaries of the project and other types of participants, like third-party participants.

€ 419 200,91
Address
GERTRUDSTRASSE 15
8401 WINTERTHUR
Switzerland

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Region
Schweiz/Suisse/Svizzera Zürich Zürich
Activity type
Higher or Secondary Education Establishments
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Total cost

The total costs incurred by this organisation to participate in the project, including direct and indirect costs. This amount is a subset of the overall project budget.

€ 419 200,91

Participants (7)

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