Harvesting electrical power through body heat in different workout activities using Peltier tiles

Abstract

This paper presents a study on harvesting electrical energy with the use of thermoelectric coolers (TEC) or peltier tiles using body heat in different workout activities. The harvesting circuit composes of a Peltier tiles, joule thief circuit and rechargeable battery. The TECs will exhibit the Seebeck effect phenomenon in which a voltage is produce when there is a temperature difference between two dissimilar conductors. Each side of the tiles will be the hot side and cool side which are interchangeable depending on the flow of current. Joule thief performs as a self oscillating voltage booster circuitry for small power applications. The rechargeable battery store the voltage collected from the joule thief. The researcher measured the voltage and current generated during different workout activities and based from the values obtained, jogging using a treadmill is the most effective workout that generated the most voltage in a certain amount of time compared to stationary bicycling and bench press. The researcher calculated the approximated time for charging the fully discharged battery and found out that it will take 38,461.54 hours for the full charge of a 1000 mAh battery rating.