Utilizing deep ocean currents to power extended duration sensors

Abstract

Energy harvesting has the potential to save billions of dollars and create ground breaking technologies for sustainable ocean monitoring systems. Replacement of batteries from the sensors deployed on sea floor is expensive and tedious process. The cost of maintenance for battery operated equipments in the deep waters may be prohibitive. Thus, it is highly desirable to develop a system that harnesses energy to prolong the life of these sensors or transducers and reduce the maintenance costs. The low energy density environment of the sea floor limits the methods that can be used for energy harvesting. Vortex Induced Vibrations (VIV) due to fluid flow plagues structures and cables in the undersea environment. The energy produced can be very destructive and the effect has been analyzed for many years. It is this phenomenon that Progeny has been investigating to power the undersea sensors. This will be accomplished by applying the force produced by VIV to piezoelectric cymbal generators and storing the energy in secondary batteries. Progeny Systems has teamed with Center for Energy Harvesting Materials and Systems (CEHMS), Virginia Tech, whom are leader in the vibration energy harvesting field, and have successfully demonstrated the power generation capability of cymbal under laboratory conditions using the boundary conditions derived from VIV. Extensive analytical modeling and ATILA based FEM analysis was conducted to optimize the performance of the cymbal transducers.