A self-powered tilt angle sensor for tall buildings based on the coupling of multiple triboelectric nanogenerator units

Abstract

Suffering from the particular working environment, it still remains challenging to monitor the inclination state of tall buildings (such as transmission line tower, street lamp and aerogenerator) in real time relying on traditional methods, which also consume considerable human and financial cost. On the other hand, there is often rich wind energy in the ambient environment where tall buildings located, but it is always neglected. Here we propose a self-powered tilt angle sensor based on an energy-harvesting triboelectric nanogenerator (EH-TENG) and a tilt-sensing triboelectric nanogenerator (TS-TENG). The rotation-mode EH-TENG thriving on soft-contact can achieve satisfying energy harvest at ultra-low rotation speed through reasonable structural design and material selection, realizing sufficient utilization of natural wind energy. When tilt of tall buildings occurs under abnormal conditions, the sanded PTFE pellet in TS-TENG as a moving part can respond to external disturbances sensitively, and its output signal is able to stably activate the trigger circuit to alert. With the cooperation of energy harvesting module and tilt sensing module, a self-powered tilt state sensor is realized and can work continuously to protect tall buildings. This work will expand the application scenarios of TENG in the infrastructure field. A self-powered tilt angle sensor for tall buildings based on the coupling of multiple TENG units has been designed and demonstrated here, which mainly consists of energy harvesting and tilt angle sensing modules. The energy-harvesting TENG (EH-TENG) relying on soft-contact can achieve impressing output performance at ultra-low rotation speed benefiting from reasonable structural design and material selection. For tilt-sensing TENG (TS-TENG), a sanded PTFE pellet is adopted as sensing part, which can not only respond sensitively to external mechanical trigger, but also ensure that the electrical signals it generated can stably actuate the corresponding function circuit. Under the energy supply of EH-TENG, the tilting state of tall buildings (such as transmission line tower, street lamp and aerogenerator) can be monitored in real time to prevent the occurrence of potential accidents. • A self-powered tilt angle sensor for tall buildings based on the coupling of multiple TENG units has been designed and proposed. • The energy-harvesting TENG (EH-TENG) relying on soft-contact can achieve impressing output performance at ultra-low rotation speed benefiting from reasonable structural design and material selection. • The sanded PTFE pellet is employed as moving component in tilt-sensing triboelectric nanogenerator (TS-TENG) for the purpose of achieving sufficient contact status and sensitive mechanical response simultaneously. • The concept of multi-units coupling can not only broaden the application perspective of TENG, but also contributes to the improvement of self-powered micro/nano systems in the Internet of Things (IoTs) era.