Energy Harvesting from a sidewalk using Piezoelectric effect

[pmadithya]

Hi,

Millions of people use sidewalk daily which is a path along the side of a road. A sidewalk may accommodate moderate changes in grade (height) and is normally separated from the vehicular section by a curb.

This project idea is about harvesting pedestrian mechanical energy and converting it into electrical energy.We have already discussed Piezoelectric sidewalk in our post Power generation using foot steps.


Concept :

This project is based on very simple concept which states that when certain solid materials put under a mechanical stress they produce electricity. These materials are known as Piezoelectric materials.Some examples of these materials are Sucrose (table sugar), Quartz and Topaz

Here's a video on how we can harvest energy using Piezoelectric effect

https://youtu.be/Xuw9frP1GNo

How can you generate energy from movement or pressure? A simple piezoelectric disk (the kind that you use as a transducer/sounder) can be used in reverse to generate a momentary voltage. This short clip shows how an LED, soldered across the disks of a piezo, illuminates when the disk is tapped or pressed. Notice that the LED lights more effectively when the piezo is pressed rather than tapped

 

[stacksmith]

May I suggest stairs? More contained and you will get a bit more umph from people stomping them.

An interesing aside, the more obese people will generate more power.

But honestly, there is little hope for helping the world with this - this is far worse than solar or wind (which is very bad). Why not tap the energy of people pressing the gas pedal of the car to run the car itself?

 

[etmabreu]

It's possible and it's being made:

**broken link removed**

 

[stacksmith]

I am sure it's possible. But what is the net energy recovered vs. the cost of the device? Enough to light an LED for a quarter of a second per step? I walk about 10,000 steps a day (counted with a pedometer). Let's say you can generate 1 mw per step (I think it's generous), you have 10W per day from me. In order to accomplish this you will have to cover at least 3kM that I walk. That will cost, in the US, probably a billion dollars, if you count all the government waste, studies, unions etc (probably more - a recent 2mile stretch of light rail near me is a 3 billion project - and that is steel rail. I am not counting research into a durable piezo surface, building factories, training union installers, permits, lobbying).

Really now. Unless you get some government idiot like Al Gore to make a movie about it and get disgustingly pointless government grants, why not focus on something that might actually work. Like more efficient gas engines, or better cargo-carrying bikes (the best way to recover people's energy anyway).

 

[jeffrey samuel]

yup true to some extent
I have heard of a road strech completely of PIEZO generators that power few blocks

 

[stacksmith]

Powers a few blocks? I seriously doubt that. Maybe lights up a few dim lights in some hallway. Well, not to be a pessimist completely, but our power consumption is in the kilowatts per day per person. 10W is really nothing. Even if a million people recover 1/10 of 1%, it is still a net loss if you include the actual manufacturing cost, maintenance, etc. Now if you grab the power of a million people walking in front of your house and don't share it, you may get a little ahead, but for the society as a whole it does squatto. Zilch. Nothing. Except wasting taxpayer dollars if the government is involved, *** forbid.

So I have to say this is one of the dumbest ideas ever, and I've seen a few. Along with perpetual engines, springs attached to shoes and 100MPG carburetors, solar and wind. O yes, corn biodiesel. Net loss. Why not just tax everyone a dollar a year, buy hearing aid batteries and make a really big stack of them and power the world with that? Or like I said, connect gas and break pedals to piezo generators and power the car with that?

Take a look at some of the energy bull***t debunkers' web sites, like Don Lancaster's tinaja site. It's really fools with good intentions that ruin our world, so don't be one.

 

[jeffrey samuel]

Powers a few blocks? I seriously doubt that. Maybe lights up a few dim lights in some hallway. Well, not to be a pessimist completely, but our power consumption is in the kilowatts per day per person. 10W is really nothing. Even if a million people recover 1/10 of 1%, it is still a net loss if you include the actual manufacturing cost, maintenance, etc. Now if you grab the power of a million people walking in front of your house and don't share it, you may get a little ahead, but for the society as a whole it does squatto. Zilch. Nothing. Except wasting taxpayer dollars if the government is involved, *** forbid.

So I have to say this is one of the dumbest ideas ever, and I've seen a few. Along with perpetual engines, springs attached to shoes and 100MPG carburetors, solar and wind. O yes, corn biodiesel. Net loss. Why not just tax everyone a dollar a year, buy hearing aid batteries and make a really big stack of them and power the world with that? Or like I said, connect gas and break pedals to piezo generators and power the car with that?

Take a look at some of the energy bull***t debunkers' web sites, like Don Lancaster's tinaja site. It's really fools with good intentions that ruin our world, so don't be one.

well be more polite here my pal

Well in your case when the great trannies where introduced they where worse than Bull**** they consumed awful lot of energy and made the work place like H.E.L.L

this is not the case now

like wise here also you have no rights to call other peoples work sh?** cos they are still developing it they never said any where that they are convinced that this is the future energy source

i may have been wrong but still i am looking for the site where i found this

never look down at an innovation at the time of development then in the later years it may be a greater boon to man

 

[stacksmith]

Well, there is innovation, and then there is ignorance and innumeracy.

Let's say instead of working, we ride a stationary bike connected to a generator for 8 hours a day. Do you think we will generate enough electricity to not use fossil fuels and save the world? Make enough power to run the refrigerator?NO.

Extend the experiment. Let's say we all ride the stationary bike generator for 1 minute a day. Does that make the world better? NNNNOOO. Who benefits? They guy who sold you the bike.

How about the piezo thing, which generates even less? Is that really worth talking about?

Ignorance, my friend, especially marketed as a green, socially important discovery, is pure evil. The people who push that crap - be it Al Gore who gets to run a carbon exchange, some ***hole who gets to make piezo sidewalks, corn farmers and lobbyists, car companies making electric cars that simply move pollution to the point of generation - get rich from ignorant, gleeful public that just eats that stuff up. They are innumerate - can't and won't do simple math to see that it makes no sense.

That is how our tax dollars are wasted, opportunists get rich, and our world sucks a little bit more.

As you can see, that really gets me angry.

 

[tpetar]

What You say to find a way to use thunders energy with big high receiver, and way for accumulation of that huge energy or some part in some concept of some kind of city power plant.


:wink:

 

[stacksmith]

You must be just baiting me.

All the green-talking, global-warming-terrified people seem to have no problems trying to actually change the weather and alter our environment.

Has anyone ever considered, for instance, that wind farms slow down the wind and change weather patterns?. In fact, being anchored, they slow down the rotation of the earth. Hydroelectric energy slows down the flow of rivers, totally messes with local ecological balances. Solar plants intercept the energy bound for the earth and convert it (with our help) to heat and garbage elsewhere. Your lightening thing affects the energy balance (even if it was cost-effective to recover. I know you are kidding). Nothing is free, my friends. We don't know the consequences.

 

[tpetar]

No my friend, "green" is just a marketing word in lots of cases, You have more mercury and other dangerous substances like lithium, nickle,... in home then earlier.

Has anyone ever considered, for instance, that wind farms slow down the wind and change weather patterns?.

I dont think that we dont have power to regulate that, nature of Earth is stronger then all people on this planet together.

 

[stacksmith]

How about farting into a plastic bag and running the world off the gas? Oh here:

https://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/newstopics/howaboutthat/2274995/Cow-farts-collected-in-plastic-tank-for-global-warming-study.html

 

[tpetar]

How about farting into a plastic bag and running the world off the gas? Oh here:
View attachment 80383

This is reallity in some EU countries. Whole farm have methane from cows. For heating and driving cars.

What do you think from where is methane on planet ?

 

[stacksmith]

All right. I've had enough *****it.

 

[tpetar]

I suggest magazine "Home Power".

 

[FvM]

Not commenting some sarcastic or polemic undertones, I can agree about the point, that "energy harvesting" doesn't compete to solve global energy problems. This is a matter of how the major energy consumption parts can be reduced by serious energy saving and how energy production can be arranged less resource destructive.

Practical energy harvesting is useful for places where no or restricted energy sources exist. I don't believe, that anyone would suggest the said sidewalk project as a substantial energy saving means. You'll possibly know better, but I neither think Al Gore promotes pipe dreams like this.

To get a clearer idea of expectable energy amounts, the harvesting projects should be calculated in terms of mechanics first. You'll notice that a step, pressing a non-elastic base with 50 kp by 1 mm would free about 0.5 Ws. Unfortunately the deflection of basic piezo element will be rather in a below µm than in a mm range. So have to think about mechanical transformation that makes the design complicated. Also piezo transducers are basically elastic and won't transfer a large share of the applied energy to electrical. Resonant operation is an exception, but will be hardly applicable in this case.

I'll stop the consideration at this point, just to clarify that there are many technical details involved that need detail research work, implying profound knowledge of mechanical and electrical engineering.

 

[tpetar]

What say to try with Peltier element. If there is some existing heat source. I think this can give better results then piezo element, if we forget wind, water, and solar methods.

Like example in cars there is lots of wasted heat, specially on exaust pipes.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=TxraJsuU7g8

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=oUHUV8dx8Mw&feature=related

or use standard hot water solar panel to get heat for peltier.

 

[jeffrey samuel]

You must be just baiting me.

All the green-talking, global-warming-terrified people seem to have no problems trying to actually change the weather and alter our environment.

Has anyone ever considered, for instance, that wind farms slow down the wind and change weather patterns?. In fact, being anchored, they slow down the rotation of the earth. Hydroelectric energy slows down the flow of rivers, totally messes with local ecological balances. Solar plants intercept the energy bound for the earth and convert it (with our help) to heat and garbage elsewhere. Your lightening thing affects the energy balance (even if it was cost-effective to recover. I know you are kidding). Nothing is free, my friends. We don't know the consequences.

your theory is worth consideration you are saying that a small farm is able to affect the pattern of the force driving it

it is like telling resistor got higher because of lower current