Eur. Phys. J. Plus (2017) 132: 253
https://doi.org/10.1140/epjp/i2017-11520-y

Regular Article

Portable triboelectric based wind energy harvester for low power applications

¹ Department of Electronics and Communication Engineering, Maharaja Surajmal Institute of Technology, C-4, JanakPuri, New Delhi, 110058, Delhi, India
² School of Engineering, Indian Institute of Technology, Mandi-175 001, Himachal Pradesh, India

^* e-mail: puneet.azad@msit.in

Received: 31 January 2017
Accepted: 27 April 2017
Published online: 9 June 2017

Abstract

This article presents conversion of rotational motion into electrical energy using triboelectricity. For this purpose, aluminium and fluorinated ethylene propylene (FEP) films are selected for generating charges during rotational motion. Energy density and power are computed by optimizing various resistors and capacitors. The maximum energy density is found to be 2560 μJ/cm³ across 33 μF. The maximum power is found to be 6.5 μW across 1 M resistor after 400 s. With the availability of such commercially available materials, it is possible to generate a lot of energy, which depends on the size of the system and type of materials. Such portable systems can be used for harvesting wind energy for low power electronic devices.