A power management circuit with 50% efficiency and large load capacity for triboelectric nanogenerator

Abstract

Recently, triboelectric nanogenerators (TENGs), as a collection technology with characteristics of high reliability, high energy density and low cost, has attracted more and more attention. However, the energy coming from TENGs needs to be stored in a storage unit effectively due to its unstable ac output. The traditional energy storage circuit has an extremely low energy storage efficiency for TENGs because of their high internal impedance. This paper presents a new power management circuit used to optimize the energy using efficiency of TENGs, and realize large load capacity. The power management circuit mainly includes rectification storage circuit and DC–DC management circuit. A rotating TENG with maximal energy output of 106 mW at 170 rpm based on PCB is used for the experimental verification. Experimental results show that the power energy transforming to the storage capacitor reach up to 53 mW and the energy using efficiency is calculated as 50%. When different loading resistances range from 0.82 to 34.5 k are connected to the storage capacitor in parallel, the power energy stored in the storage capacitor is all about 52.5 mW. Getting through the circuit, the power energy coming from the TENGs can be used to drive numerous conventional electronics, such as wearable watches.