Energy Harvester Produces Power from Local Environment, Eliminating Batteries in Wireless Sensors

Focus:

This two-page Design Note presents examples of energy-harvesting power source circuits built around Linear’s LTC3588-1 IC, which provides rectification, management of energy storage, and voltage regulation to various types of energy harvesting transducers. Energy harvesting circuits shown here include a piezoelectric source that produces 100 microwatts at 3.3 V, a Seebeck source that outputs 300 milliwatts at 2.5 V from a heat source, and an electric field source that generates 200 microwatts at 3.3 V from the EM field radiated by fluorescent tubes. These circuits specify component values including specific transducer models, or (dimensions in the case of the electric field harvester). Note describes how an energy harvesting power system works, and lists the approximate power levels that can be obtained from various types of transducers including photovoltaic, Seebeck, piezoelectric, and radio frequency (RF).

What you’ll learn:

• How to build energy harvesting power sources based on the LTC3588-1 for powering wireless sensors
• How to replace batteries with energy harvesting power sources in wireless sensor applications
• How to understand what levels of electrical power are available from various types of energy harvesting transducers

View the Source

Author & Publication:

Jim Drew, Linear Technology, Vendor website, Oct 01 2010

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