Abstract
Energy harvesting has a vital role in building reliable Environmental Wireless Sensor Networks (EWSNs), without needing to replace a discharged battery. Solar energy is one of the main renewable energy sources that can be used to efficiently charge a battery. This paper introduces two solar energy harvesters and their power measurements at different light conditions in order to charge rechargeable AA batteries powering EWSN nodes. The first harvester is a primitive energy harvesting circuit that is built using elementary off-shelf components, while the second harvester is based on a commercial boost converter chip. To prove the effectiveness of harvesting solar energy, five EWSN nodes were distributed at a nature reserve (the Audubon Society of Western Pennsylvania, USA) and the sunlight at their locations was recorded for more than five months. For each recorded illumination, the corresponding harvested energy has been estimated and compared with the average energy consumption of the EWSN with the most power consumption. The results show that the daily harvested energy effectively compensates for the energy consumption of the EWSN nodes, and the battery charge capacity of 295 mAh can reliably support their daily dynamic energy consumption.
Highlights
Wireless Sensor Networks (WSNs) have extensive popularity in the field of environmental monitoring [1,2,3,4,5]
Environmental Wireless Sensor Networks (EWSNs) nodes are deployed in open areas; they are not connected to the main power supply because of high wiring cost and difficulty
A battery with a maximum charge capacity of 295 daily dynamic energy consumption of the we find that the primitive energy milliampereꞏhour can reliably support the daily dynamic energy consumption of the EWSN
Summary
Wireless Sensor Networks (WSNs) have extensive popularity in the field of environmental monitoring [1,2,3,4,5]. An energy harvester can be utilized to scavenge the surrounding ambient energy (such as heat, electromagnetic, motion, and light energy) and convert it to electrical energy that charges a battery and powers an EWSN node [9,10]. 4 presents harvester and component selection; Section 3 introduces the utilization of bq25570 chip in harvesting the measured light intensities at the deployed nodes and shows the generated current from the solar. 3 of 3 of solar energy and how to determine the values of its external passive components; Section 4 presents harvesters and the estimated remaining charge nodes in the and battery, discussescurrent the important the measured light intensities at the deployed shows theitgenerated from theresults.
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